Advanced Television

Inside Satellite

Chris Forrester

Chris Forrester is one of the most experienced and highly regarded journalists in the field. His insight and analysis, particularly in the satellite and pay-TV arena, is highly prized. He has written for all the major business journals in the sector as well as several national newspapers.

CBA 5G decision later this year

Equity analysts from investment bank Exane/BNPP spent an intense week talking to industry executives as well as regulators in Washington, and taking advantage of the Satellite 2019 conflab. The result is a 15-page report which very much focuses on the prospects for the C-Band Alliance’s financially important release of some 180 MHz of C-band spectrum […]

May 14, 2019

Telesat will produce 20-25 satellites per month

Telesat’s Erwin Hudson (VP/Low Earth Orbiting broadband division) speaking at last week’s Washington Satellite 2019 conference, said that the successful bidder for the company’s planned LEO fleet of “quite large” craft would be producing satellites at a rate of 20-25 a month. Hudson told delegates that Ottawa-based Telesat was already working with several antenna suppliers […]

May 13, 2019

C-Band a hot topic at Satellite 2019

Analysts from investment bank Jefferies held a 7-hour series of VIP meetings with key industry executives at the giant Satellite 2019 show, and the bank’s subsequent comments from analysts Giles Thorne and Sebastian Patulea make fascinating reading. Two topics dominated their meetings: “A greater interest in High Throughput Satellites/LEO than in previous years, [and] a […]

May 8, 2019

FCC wants extra info on C-Band scheme

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is asking the C-Band Alliance (of Intelsat, SES, Eutelsat and Telesat) to clarify certain key points on the Alliance’s plan to reallocate 180 MHz of C-band (3.7-4.2 GHz) satellite spectrum to speed the roll-out of 5G over the US. The FCC’s request, made on the eve of the important 2019 […]

May 7, 2019

SES sets route from 4K to 8K

Northern Sky Research (NSR) forecasts that by the end of this year there will be some 196 4K channels broadcasting. SES, in a presentation at the recent NAB show in Las Vegas, says they are already carrying 50 of them, and that around the world there are a total of 131 4K channels available to […]

May 2, 2019

Intelsat’s extra $4bn target

Intelsat’s CEO Steve Spengler, talking to analysts following on from the company’s Q1 results, said that newly introduced managed services are expected to provide $4 billion of increased revenue opportunity industry-wide through 2023. One of the extra services is a “blended satellite wireless Internet service that provides reliable cloud access regardless of location”. Spengler said […]

May 1, 2019

Anxieties over Eutelsat’s upcoming numbers

Eutelsat will unveil its Q3 numbers (to March 31st) on May 14th and at least one investment analyst is concerned that shareholders might be in for some bad news. Consequently, Deutsche Bank is recommending that shareholders ‘SELL’ their stock. Deutsche Bank says that last week’s SES results, where its Video division saw revenues tumble 8 […]

April 30, 2019

SES gets uplift on results

Satellite operator SES gained a very useful 8.3 per cent (€1.16) share price gain on April 26th following mostly favourable comments from analysts reporting on the company’s results, and in particular CEO Steve Collar’s comments on the C-Band Alliance’s plan to restructure some capacity over the US. Collar told the market analysts that there was […]

April 29, 2019

Intelsat’s lost satellite: What lessons for the future?

Last week Intelsat declared its IS-29e as a “total loss”. Analysts at Northern Sky Research (NSR) said that writing off 12 years of near-guaranteed revenue (and adding 6552 kgs of space debris to the crucially important geostationary orbital arc) is an overall bitter pill for Intelsat. The satellite was not insured. NSR said that while […]

April 26, 2019

Major questions over Musk’s Starlink plans

Elon Musk, when he is not arguing with the SEC over Tweets, or Wall Street over missed Tesla car production targets, is frequently busy talking about his Starlink concept  – which sees thousands of satellites girdling the planet. Just a few days ago Musk requested that SpaceX investors to raise an additional $500 million to […]

April 25, 2019