Advanced Television

Study: Satellites are good for all of us?

February 26, 2014

An alliance of leading satellite industry associations issued a call for application case studies that illustrate the immense contributions of the global satellite industry to business, government and human welfare.  The group – made up of the Society of Satellite Professionals International, European Satellite Operators Association, Global VSAT Forum and Satellite Industry Association – is working to promote satellite’s indispensable role in the economy and human affairs to help prepare for the intense spectrum negotiations expected at the World Radiocommunications Conference 2015 (WRC-2015).

Companies, academic researchers, industry trade groups and others are invited to submit stories of satellite changing the world, from supporting free elections to improving education, providing news and entertainment to raising crop yields, saving lives to maintaining security in a dangerous world. The cases studies, acknowledging the companies involved, will form the core of a briefing book used by the industry to help make its case in the spectrum negotiations, and will contribute to the longer-term effort to raise the profile of the industry across all of its current and future markets.

Speaking on behalf of the group, SSPI Executive Director Robert Bell said, “We know the life-changing impact our industry has on business, the free flow of information, education, safety at sea and on land and many other fields.   We are looking for powerful stories that dramatically illustrate how our planet relies on the faint radio signals that travel between earth and space.  Our goal is to back up our industry’s lobbying efforts by presenting the human case: why business, government, health, safety and welfare rely on interference-free access to space.”

With WRC-2015 deliberations focusing on sharing of C-band, the group will give first consideration to case studies of applications using that frequency band.  But no satellite band is ultimately secure in a communications market striving to meet huge and growing demand, and all case studies are welcome.

This call for case studies is part of the Industry Message Summit, a collaborative effort of SSPI, ESOA, GVF and SIA.

Categories: Articles, DTH/Satellite