The C-Band Alliance (CBA) used a letter to Senator John Kennedy, the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and to Christopher Coons, a ranking member of the same committee. The letter was ostensibly to correct some misstatements made by two influential organisations. One “misrepresentation” came from David Williams of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance who in […]

Sami Kassab, a satellite analyst at investment bank Exane/BNPP, issued useful summary of the October 17th US Senate hearing on matters concerning the Federal Communications Commission and in particular the FCC’s thinking on the C-Band Alliance’s (CBA) plan for C-band over the US. Evidently, Senator John Kennedy used robust language in pushing his view that […]

30,000 satellites is not a typo Elon Musk, rocket man, Tesla man, Hyperloop man, and a highly enthusiastic backer of getting mankind onto Mars, now says that his original plan for his ‘Starlink’ broadband by satellite’ scheme for 12,000 satellites isn’t quite enough. He is asking the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) for permission to launch […]

The MIPCOM programming market opened with a packed schedule of UHD content, in both 4K and the even better 33 million-pixel version 8K. Programmers from around the world are showcasing their very best 4K (and 8K) content including the BBC,  ZDF, France Televisions, Discovery, China Media, Caracol (Colombia), NHK, BlueAnt/Love Nature, Travelxp4K, Paramax, FTV and […]

The US STELA Act permits households to receive re-transmitted TV signals from far-distant broadcasters. It is due to be examined by a US government committee on October 23rd, and its future is not guaranteed. The Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act of 2010 exempts local broadcasters from needing retransmission consent in order to supply network […]

Sea Launch was a scheme to use an adapted oil rig to launch rockets. The project had plenty of successes – 32 launches – but was badly affected by a few failures, and then bankruptcy in 2009. It emerged from bankruptcy in 2010 but has since been somewhat bogged down in various legal disputes with […]

Investment bank Morgan Stanley says it expects the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to publish its Final Report and Order on the C-Band Alliance’s (CBA) proposals in November. The CBA wants to reassign 180 MHz of C-band satellite spectrum and auction off the bandwidth for use by the 5G industry. Importantly, the bank says the FCC […]

More information has emerged of a recent meeting between Eutelsat CEO Rodolphe Belmer and the Chairman and two Commissioners of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and at which Belmer told Chairman Ajit Pai that Eutelsat was in favour of freeing up a slightly higher portion of C-band spectrum (around 25 per cent) and would consider […]

A company registered in the Cayman Islands is again trying to get a satellite launched despite alleged links with backers from China. Global-IP (not to be confused with Global IP Solutions) wants to finance and build a satellite to provide sub-Saharan Africa with 150 Gb/s broadband. But the company has some history behind it. In […]

Eutelsat will unveil its Q1 numbers on October 30th (Eutelsat’s financial year runs from July 1st to June 30th). Analysts at investment bank Exane/BNPP previews the numbers saying that it expects Eutelsat to report a mixed bag of Q1 revenue growth trends. “While we expect the Video Broadcast division to post 1 per cent organic […]