Multi-Orbit Operators Pitch the Value of Resiliency and Network Optionality

New startups and strategic partnerships are coming together to provide resiliency and network options to an increasingly critical multi-orbit landscape. That was the message from executives involved in building and providing multi-orbit satellite system options at SATELLITE.

Yahsat Space Services CEO Ali Al Hashemi spoke on the panel on Tuesday the same day that Yahsat’s parent company, Space42, announced a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Viasat to explore ecosystem partnership options for developing a 5G non-terrestrial network (NTN) initiative. Al Hashemi said that while Yahsat mostly operates in Geostationary Orbit (GEO), the company is exploring direct-to-device applications and Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations for the future.

Eutelsat Group CEO Eva Berneke said that 2025 will be the year when Eutelsat ramps up constellation activity. Eutelsat operates 35 Geostationary Orbit (GEO) satellites and the OneWeb Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) constellation of more than 600 satellites.

With recent geopolitical tension between the U.S. and Europe over the war in Ukraine, some European leaders have been calling for European alternatives to SpaceX’s Starlink connectivity. Berneke recently authored an op-ed calling Europe to secure its strategic autonomy in space.

“The priority is making sure that all verticals are served,” she said. “We have a lot of government interest into providing alternatives to starting across multiple uses in government and military use. So ramping up around the EU, complementing our existing strong team positions for connectivity, is key.”

Eutelsat is finalizing integrating talent from the OneWeb merger. “We are now one and a half years down the road of that, but there's still quite some work to make sure that we have a fully functional one single team,” Berneke added.

The focus of Rivada Space Networks, founded in 2022 by CEO Declan Ganley, is getting ready for launch next year. There has been some uncertainty around Rivada’s progress, but Ganley announced this week the company plans to deploy its first satellites in 2026. Rivada is continuing to raise capital, build up its team, and build up its order backlog with customers. The company is working to build the Outernet, an interconnected network of satellites in LEO for secure, enterprise connectivity. Ganley said there has been increased interest recently in Rivada’s approach.

“There's a lot of what we call new demand out there in the environment,” Ganley said. “The recent spate of cable attacks and the changing global environment is certainly driving demand.”

Neo Space Group, the space company formed in 2024 and owned by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, is considering options in satellite ownership and operation. Today, the company has “a lot of irons in the fire,” according to the company CEO Martijn Blanken. “We are working hard to build a global marketplace,” he said, with the company working on a number of “global plays.”

When asked about strategic positioning in the market, Al Hashemi said there’s no one answer. “We are trying to do an open architectural system that can cater for all the stakeholders that want to join the direct-to-device initiative,” he said. “Network consolidation will be the answer. It all depends on the needs of the market.”

Ganley believes that connectivity as a service is the future. “Starlink is a global broadband provider which provides a last mile solution that is anchored to the internet,” he said. “We don't do that. We’re going to do something very different to that.”

He explained Rivada’s concept of the Outernet, which he described as the world's first completely self-contained global communications network.

“That means that we don't need to touch anybody else's network. It's completely gateway-less architecture so that you can maintain data sovereignty, data residency, data security, and just avoid the harm of the subsea cables and the gateways and the stuff that everything else has to go through,” Ganley said. “It’s the best way to avoid being hijacked.”

When competing in the market, it does not make sense to go head-to-head with Starlink on the same use cases, said Berneke. “It makes sense to focus on different use cases, and present an absolutely fantastic consumer product that is very standardized, very easy to install and all that.”

Eutelsat works with many markets, including maritime and government users.

“But it's also a lot of users that simply want multiple sources of supply, even in the cases where we are head to head,” she said. “A lot of our customers say they want alternatives. They don't want to be caught in a potential monopoly situation with a single supplier. They want to have multiple solutions.”

They're also looking for a resilience process, and which is also the whole argument behind a multi-orbit partnership, Berneke said. “You want resiliency in the networks. You want to have the best of both worlds.”

It was noted in the discussion that there are gaps in the market for multi-orbit use, especially in places like the Middle East and East Africa. “Many governments want to have a level of control over the infrastructure that they need in times of trouble,” Blanken said.

“Saudi Arabia will argue that they live in a somewhat challenging neighborhood, and it's not necessarily as stable as other parts of the world. They want a level of control if problems do arise. That in itself is a reason to invest in the infrastructure," he said. "For those countries, based on economical grounds, and on data sovereignty grounds, it doesn't really matter how much it costs.”

Ganley said they have been talking with customers about data sovereignty, data residency and data security for years now. “You don't actually have to build your own network to audit the trail of your data. There are other ways that you can achieve that data sovereignty,” he said. “There's an awareness that there needs to be multiple alternatives. It's not even a multi-orbit thing. It's just having optionality and having flexibility so that you can ensure that you've got sovereignty data, etc, in a manner that is not subject to the high winds of political change and disruptive times that we are in.” VS