A Fresh Look at Flyaway Terminals

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Flyaway terminals have evolved over the years to become important tools in the satellite industry. They are used by both commercial and military customers alike, and have become a mainstay for organizations that must establish broadband connections in time-sensitive situations or in destinations beyond the blacktop. What started out as a video uplink that was easily transported has morphed into a market segment with numerous designs, each slightly different and intended for specific applications.

What is a Flyaway Terminal?

A flyaway terminal is anything designed to pack up in a suitcase for transport, according to Jim Oliver, founder and CEO of AvL Technologies. He talks of the cases being air transportable, allowing terminals to be moved around easily and quickly deployed. The term flyaway covers a broad range of terminals and it helps to break them down into categories.

“The first category includes terminals that pack into airline carry-on cases, and the second category packs into a case that can be checked as baggage. Size and weight restriction apply to these cases and occasionally those restrictions change. The next category includes terminals whose cases can be air freighted to their destination. Currently FedEx can express freight cases up to 150 pounds in weight, allowing you to transport cases that are too big or too heavy to be checked as baggage on a commercial airline. If heavier than 150 pounds, it must ship air freight, which can take more than one day,” Oliver says.

He also talks of air cargo pallet as another category. These are generally larger terminals designed to fit on a pallet inside an air cargo container, he explains. Terminals up to 3.8 meter antennas – and perhaps larger – can be shipped using this method. According to Oliver, this allows military users to ship by commercial airfreight instead waiting for a DoD transport aircraft.

Fly-and-drive terminals are another class of flyaway that can be transported by air and are designed to be easily clamped onto a luggage rack of an SUV, Oliver says. “Broadcast networks periodically want to buy or rent a vehicle when they get to a destination and then install an auto-point unit to the luggage rack. We built two for a news network two weeks before the Iraq invasion and their correspondents drove in behind the troops. This concept has grown in popularity since then,” he adds noting that terminals could be further differentiated as either manual point or auto-point antennas.

What are Customers Asking For?

Customers are becoming more demanding, and they now want flyaway terminals that weigh nothing but can do anything that is needed, says Darin Beakley, VP of sales at Sat-Lite Technologies. He puts the emphasis on weight as the key challenge whether it is in the commercial or military market. Terminals need to be both rugged and stiff, which requires a lot of engineering work. Composite materials are lighter and stronger than metal but they cost more to fabricate, he says.

“Flyaway terminals are somewhat like foldable, tradeshow displays. They are marvels of engineering and pack down into very small cases, but they are expensive in small quantities – quantity brings the price down,” Beakley adds.

David Provencher, general manager, Cobham Satcom, explains that the flyaway market is changing: it is now all about regional coverage. He says military end users may not know where their flyaway terminals will be deployed, but they need to be able to change continents and easily reconfigure the terminal to find a different satellite, possibly in a different frequency, and then connect into a different modem network.

“Users don’t want to buy a different terminal for every continent. Antennas need to be able to handle all the different configurations. Ideally, one antenna needs to be to communicate via C-, X-, Ku-, K-, and Ka-band. You must consider the electrical and mechanical properties of the terminal, as well as physics,” Provencher says. “Each satellite and network operator has different performance requirements for antennas. So it’s expected the antennas to be accepted and approved by all satellite operators and regulators.”

Building products that meet the International Air Transport Association (IATA) baggage requirements is another challenge, according to Provencher. He says a 1.0 meter or larger flyaway terminal that can be checked as luggage typically cost two to three times as much as a terminal that can be air freighted.

Gary Moore, sales director at GigaSat, summed up the challenge of manufacturing flyaway terminals, by saying that end users want the smallest, lightest terminal that can be quickly set up and operate in the harshest conditions, including snow, sand, and humidity. “They must be able to change their operational requirements quickly, making the circle you have now into a square. Flyaway terminals are the holy grail of customer requirements,” he says.

High Throughput Satellites will be an attractive option because they provide… more bandwidth and allow for the use of very small antennas. Our thinking is that HTS equipment prices must not be a constraint for a customer to move to an HTS satellite. If the equipment cost is the same, it won’t hinder the transition.—Claude Rousseau, NSR

User’s Perspective

CNN has been using flyaway terminals since the mid ‘80s. The broadcaster began using them in the United States before satellite trucks were widely available, and then started deploying them to large international events. CNN has covered many major stories with flyaways like Gorbachev’s trip to China that turned into the Tiananmen Square crackdown, the fall of the Berlin Wall, both wars in Iraq, the 2004 and 2011 tsunamis, etc. “At this moment we have both Ku- and Ka-band systems deployed in Istanbul, Turkey covering that developing story,” says Frank Barnett, vice president CNN satellites & transmissions.

While CNN uses all types of satellite uplinks, flyaway terminals are the most helpful for long-duration planned events in one location, and on stories where getting a truck is not a possible or an easy option, according to Barnett. “Smaller and lighter is best for getting flyaways to remote locations quickly and cost effectively, and the capability to transmit multiple HD video signals to support our CNN networks and affiliates. Also integrating phone and data with the video adds a huge benefit to field users,” he says, adding that the terminals show “great promise for remote newsgathering.”

However, licensing and logistics to get flyaway terminals into some countries can be challenging. But CNN has been deploying flyaways for more than 20 years, working on overcoming those obstacles. “Our goal is to bring our audience the news and pictures on all our platforms as quickly as we can from anywhere in the world,” Barnett says.

Developments

Driven by customer demand, the flyaway market continues to evolve, says Oliver. “There is now pressure from the market to get all the pieces of a flyaway into a single piece of carry-on luggage. The U.S. military uses the acronym SWaP to summarize their needs in terms of Size, Weight and Power. We can package a single case carry-on antenna but for apertures smaller than 90 centimeters transponder-hungry spread spectrum technology must be incorporated to avoid adjacent satellite interference. Even though the cost of Ku bandwidth continues to increase, it is still less expensive than using L-band,” he notes.

Oliver also believes another factor driving the market’s development is the renewed interest in manual point antennas, which he says eliminate the motors and power supplies used in the auto-point mechanism saving both weight and space. These antennas, however, require more training and also some tools, such as a spectrum analyzer. The market has responded to this opportunity and Oliver says there are now several smartphone apps that function as a spectrum analyzer.

So, as the demand changes, new categories of flyaway terminals are emerging. The newest flyaway is a man pack, which is essentially a terminal in a backpack. “If they [the terminals] are deployed into an area without electricity, they can operate on batteries. If there isn’t commercial power available, the terminals are generally operated for short periods to conserve power. Extra batteries, solar chargers, or fuel cells are included in the man packs to recharge the batteries,” says Oliver.

But the largest buzz in the market, according to Provencher, has to do with the development of Ka-band flyaway terminals. He says everyone in the industry is talking about Ka-band, and that the appeal is based around smaller antennas providing higher data rates at a lower cost.

“The value proposition is attractive to both commercial and military users but there are some inherent issues which must be solved. Ka-band satellites use very narrow spot beams. When you move from one spot beam to another it’s like moving into a new network. This adds a layer of complexity that must be solved transparent to the user,” Provencher says.

However, there are issues to work through. Provencher highlighted that in the early days of cell phones, calls would disconnect if you moved from one cell to another. This is the case for flyaway terminals now, which is something the industry has to improve.

High Throughput Satellites (HTS) are also driving development in this market. “Most High Throughput Satellites (HTS) are governed by one network architecture and use proprietary technology. There will be intelligence embedded in the terminals that allow them to make sure they are on the right satellite and using the right polarization regardless of location,” Provencher adds.

Also, hybrid networks have come into vogue over the last decade, blending satellite with some other transport technology, and the concept is alive and well in the flyaway market. Gary Hatch, president and CEO of ATCi, discussed their success selling affordable flyaway terminals to production companies and universities. “Schools are realizing that they must drive their own brand and alumni are interested in seeing what is going on, especially sporting events. Using a flyaway terminal, universities can broadcast events, such as a road football game, or events on campus, which aren’t near a fiber connection. Universities are finding that they don’t need ESPN to do this. They can do their own branding,” he says.

ATCi includes 4G wireless packages with bonded failover providing an alternate path for the video transmission. “If your job is to transmit, you need to make sure you can get it done. An alternate path is very important if you are serious about the business,” adds Hatch.

Inmarsat is also promoting hybrid Ku/L band, which can provide both high throughput via their Ka-band constellation and also offer L-band service as a backup service, as well as a back channel for out-of-band maintenance.

Market Analysis

Moore provided thoughts on where the flyaway market is heading from a vendor’s perspective, making the point that government and military sales have been a traditional market for flyaway terminals. He highlighted the fact the U.S. military’s WGS program, including their partners in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Denmark, have been a large market but the U.S. has lately scaled down due to budget concerns. However, the success in the U.S. military with flyaways has been mirrored around the world and adopted by other governments. So, other markets are ready to take up the slack.

“Newer emerging markets for flyaways include Latin America and Africa. We see growth in larger markets, such as China, India, and Brazil, as well as the more established markets of Europe and United States. In each of these markets, we see parallel activity between broadcasters and governments and militaries,” Moore says.

Claude Rousseau, senior analyst for NSR, a telecom market research firm, explains that flyaway sales have been going up. “The flyaway market is gaining momentum, especially for Ku-band terminals. The prices for terminals are coming down and sales are going up. BGAN terminals are competing with flyaways but they are much cheaper. With a flyaway terminal, FSS operators can offer more bandwidth at a flat monthly fee compared to L-band. Flyaway terminals are becoming lighter and easier to carry, making them more convenient to use,” he says.

Rousseau points out that while the military and broadcasters currently drive the market, the enterprise segment is growing faster, with many terminals sold to the energy and mining industries.

In its latest market study, NSR believes that service revenues from land-mobile terminals will increase by 300 percent over the next 10 years to $300 million. These projected sales revenues include other types of terminals besides pure flyaways, such as transportable terminals, and excludes sales of L-band terminals. Even when making allowances for those exceptions, NSR believes the market for flyaway terminals will increase significantly over the next decade.

Rousseau says it is important to note that Inmarsat is developing an ecosystem of land terminals for Global Xpress. He says that 60,000 BGAN terminals have been sold, that those users could be converted to Global Xpress flyaway terminals, and that those mobility customers will eventually need more bandwidth and seek out other options.

Like others, Rousseau points to the growing influence of HTS and the impact this might have on the overall market. “High Throughput Satellites will be an attractive option because they provide… more bandwidth and allow for the use of very small antennas. Our thinking is that HTS equipment prices must not be a constraint for a customer to move to an HTS satellite. If the equipment cost is the same, it won’t hinder the transition. The question is how much will it cost to transition a BGAN customer to Global Xpress? Inmarsat must find a way to keep BGAN users from escaping and converting them to Global Xpress,” he says.

Thus, while the flyaway market has seen a lot of exciting developments over the last decade, the panorama is likely to see even more developments in the coming future.