SATELLITE 2018 was a huge win for the satellite industry for a long list of reasons. From a show organizer’s perspective, SATELLITE 2018 saw the largest year-over-year increase in attendance I’ve seen since working on the event.
Isotropic Systems Founder John Finney unveiled his company’s new all-in-one terminal/antenna that ships with dual beam capability, and announced partnership deals with iDirect, SES, Inmarsat, and OneWeb — reuniting the original O3b triumvirate of Finney, Steve Collar (SES), and Greg Wyler (OneWeb).
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Satellite operators appeared whole-heartedly embracing the transition toward data networking as the top revenue-generating product. The Tuesday opening general session panel featured the CEOs of the largest satellite operators answering questions from Cisco, Royal Caribbean, and Wells Fargo about steering technology in the 5G/IOT/Big Data era.
Launch service providers couldn’t be happier. Blue Origin, SpaceX and ULA rolled out big launch contract announcements during the week. SpaceX president and COO Gwynne Shotwell received a standing ovation at her Satellite Executive of the Year acceptance speech, and slipped in an announcement about the pricing model of its upcoming satellite internet service.
The race to join Iridium in LEO has intensified. Satellite manufacturers face difficulty with this transition — GEO satellite orders have all but stopped, forcing larger manufacturers to completely reinvent their businesses.
The Startup Space 2018 grand prize winner was Dan Ceperley of LeoLabs, a company bringing advanced space debris mapping services to LEO. Next year’s show will be in May, giving the industry 14 months to digest this new information before reconvening. VS
