Robert Bell

Data-driven decision-making has come to the agricultural industry, and satellite technology is driving its adoption, offering valuable insights into crop health, soil conditions and resource management. According to the Global […]

In an August 2024 podcast interview, the past and present President of the United States said that “when these poor fools talk about global warming, they don’t call it that […]

About one year ago, the chief of space operations for the U.S. Space Force spoke to attendees at the Air, Space and Cyber Conference in Maryland. General Chance Saltzman described […]

For at least two decades, there has been rising recognition and concern about a problem for our industry. Not a little problem. A big, hairy bodacious problem that could put […]

Thanks to Starlink and OneWeb, broadband from the sky dominates the view of the satellite data business for both the industry and the public. It’s all about hundreds of Mbps […]

The longer you live, the more you realize how much of the world’s life takes place in the shadows. They are not good places, the shadows. It’s where warlords grow […]

Do you ever pause to consider what’s behind the everyday world you inhabit? Have you wondered who built the bridge you are driving over, what’s going on inside your phone […]

Have you ever been really, really thirsty?  Not just dry-mouthed in the middle of the night or longing for a cold drink after an afternoon in the sun. But truly […]

A few short years ago, the question posed by that title would have been laughable. How could the future of the internet – with its 997 terabits per second of […]

For all of its history, the satellite industry has been a business of niches. Broadcasting, maritime, energy, internet, cellular backhaul, military and civilian government. If you’ve been around a while, […]

“You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.” So wrote the Lebanese poet and artist Kahil Gibran. I was of a generation that read […]

The economist Herbert Stein once wrote, “If something can’t go on forever, it will stop.” The question, of course, is when.  It can be an exasperating question.  Human beings have […]

The space business needs to recruit more people who know less. Strange, right?  The global pandemic dramatized how important skills are to personal economic progress. As states and countries locked […]

The satellite business has developed a bandwidth obsession.  Really, it’s nothing to apologize for. After decades as one of the most capacity-constrained communications technologies, the industry has lately been enjoying […]

For an industry that aims to go where no one has gone before, space and satellite has an imagination problem. You are probably familiar with the 2018 report from Morgan […]

Has it ever struck you that the satellite industry does all the work and the mobile industry has all the fun? It is an unfair comparison, of course.  But consider: […]

The digital economy has become a major driver of total economic growth. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) estimated the combined value of platform companies with a […]

In 2018, natural disasters claimed 10,400 lives and caused $160 billion worth of damage, according to German reinsurer Munich Re. That’s down from $350 billion and 13,000 lives lost in […]

Working in space and satellite is technically challenging.  Our friends in social media, online shopping, and ridesharing have it easy by comparison. It can be thrilling. Who else launches and lands […]

What’s the proper dividing line between what government does and what business does? This is not a political question — it is meant in the context of the space industry. […]

Remember the talking car? You would have to be of a certain age to do so. And I’m not talking about Knight Rider, the TV show about the robot car […]

There is a gap running down the center of the world. A gap between the privileged, and those struggling for access. Access to good work, knowledge, and the means to […]

Forecasts on future Internet of Things (IOT) business opportunities are enough to give a salesperson high blood pressure. IDC forecasts a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 13.6 percent from 2017 […]

Back in the Jurassic Age, the big U.S. television networks distributed programs to affiliate stations over AT&T Long Lines. Then PBS and HBO showed that satellite offered a better deal, […]

The new generation of connected cars — especially autonomous vehicles — will be a boom market for satellite, says the satellite industry. Not so fast, says the mobile industry. 5G […]

By the year 2050, the world’s population is expected to hit 10 billion. Feeding that population will mean increasing global food production by 70 percent — without poisoning the world’s […]

The Internet of Things (IOT) is projected to be one of the biggest technology growth engines of all time. Forecasters estimate there will be up to 70 billion connected devices […]

In the good old days — before today’s bandwidth bonanza began pushing transponder capacity prices ever lower — the point of most satellite communications was the communications. It was about […]

If there is one truth the satellite industry universally accepts, it is that mobility is key to the future. Broadcasting cost-effectively one-to-many has always been satellite’s secret sauce. In a […]

If there is one truth the satellite industry universally accepts, it is that mobility is key to the future. Broadcasting cost-effectively one-to-many has always been satellite’s secret sauce. In a […]