Viasat CEO: “Inmarsat acquisition a big step”
June 20, 2023
By Chris Forrester
Viasat’s CEO Mark Dankberg, in a letter to shareholders following the acquisition of Inmarsat, has said that the purchase represented a “big step” for the business and that the next move was to thoughtfully integrate two companies into a single cohesive team with common purpose, shared insights, targeted innovation, and trusted service delivery.
“We have the ingredients to be very successful in large growth markets. Success will not be a one-dimensional thing – it will not come from being all things to all people. Instead, we can be highly successful offering the most attractive value propositions to carefully selected market segments – earning the business, respect and trust of our entire ecosystem of customers, end-users, suppliers, partners, investors, and the many partner nations where we offer service. Fortunately, we already have solid foundations in many of the segments that we target,” said Dankberg.
He said that the new, combined business, had two main near-term objectives: “First, is to maintain our business momentum in all our business areas. It is fantastic that both companies completed the most recent quarter with record results. Second, is to quickly and purposefully integrate and evolve into a new organisation so that as a unified team we can develop competitive advantages in our service offering.”
Dankberg listed what he described as key “strategic themes” for growth:
· Enabling roaming
· Dynamic bandwidth optimization
· Harmonising kits
· Harmonising plans and Service Level Agreements (SLAs).
· Business model evolution
· Direct to device
He added: “It has taken a lot of work to get to the point where we have these opportunities before us. I’m personally proud of the commitment, persistence, and dedication shown by so many people to work through all the steps to completing the transaction at both Viasat and Inmarsat. Our success would not have been possible without the support of an incredibly talented group of employees. We are now one team – Viasat.”