Today’s IP technology panels talked a lot about “untapped” growth sources for the industry and, of course, the impact of the economic crisis on supposedly well-insulated markets.

There was also plenty of “cautious optimism” to be thrown around.

In my opinion, optimism is optimism and the satellite industry has plenty of opportunities to capitalize on. First off, it is probably the only industry out there that is not experiencing massive layoffs and losses, yet, it’s also in line to receive stimulus money from the government. For ISPs, the broadband stimulus bill is a multi-billion dollar gift for rural roll-out and offering the potential to establish a new customer base.

For government markets, you have an upcoming military operation in Afghanistan and unprecedented demand for bandwidth from end users. In civil space, you have an imagery market boosted by a U.S. Department of Energy that has 10 times larger than it was last year. There are several energy initiatives that will be research-driven through imagery satellites.

For video-on-demand services and broadcasters, you have families staying home, watching TV, not going out and choosing to getting rid of their extra automobiles over their HD and Internet services. Did I mention that IP traffic and demand doubles every two years?

An old adage was brought up during the opening technology panel — with every crisis comes opportunity, and my optimism is a little bit more than “cautious.”

-Jeffrey Hill