The Tuesday Opening General Session during SATELLITE 2025. Photo: Steven David for Access Intelligence

The team at Analysys Mason shares its top 10 takeaways from SATELLITE 2025, looking at the impact of geopolitics, the direct-to-device (D2D) ecosystem, supply chain issues for manufacturing, and more.

1. Geopolitics Takes Center Stage

Geopolitics has always been a key theme in space; however, it took center stage at Satellite 2025.  The impact of rapid-fire U.S. policy decisions, calls for alternatives to SpaceX/Starlink, the rise of space sovereignty, and the realization that space is more critical to governments than ever all served to frame a debate that is shifting by the minute.

While SpaceX forever changed the industry, the hyper speed of geopolitical change continues to take the space industry out of its comfort zone, which is typically defined by long(er) cycles and more predictable outcomes. The overwhelming attendee sentiment was to expect a bumpy ride ahead.

2. Time to Capture Value for the D2D Ecosystem

The D2D market is hitting an inflection point with T-Mobile/Starlink starting beta services, Skylo launching services with Verizon and Deutsche Telekom, AST and Lynk attracting more funding or regulators like the FCC and Ofcom evolving the regulatory framework to unlock these services. But the key question of how mobile network operators (MNOs) and satellite constellations will capture value from these systems is still open.

It is apparent that in these first stages of the technology, with only emergency services and messaging available, the direct revenue opportunity is limited as actors like Apple are offering the service for free. However, there is still massive value to be generated by these services through enhancing MNOs’ subscriber retention, driving clients to premium plans and capturing new subscribers.

A recent survey carried by Analysys Mason showed that 82% of subscribers considering churning in the next 6 months show interest in satellite D2D service. Reducing churn is critical for MNOs, and it can very quickly scale to 100s of millions of dollars’ worth of recurring revenues if MNOs use D2D as a tool to enhance loyalty.

3. Satellite’s Inclusion in the Telecom Ecosystem is Crucial to Survival

The traditional satellite industry needs to urgently look for new markets and to accelerate the pace of innovation at a time when Starlink is becoming monopolistic in many markets. The satellite industry is just scratching the surface of the opportunities brought by the integration with the mainstream Telco ecosystem.

The inclusion of satellite in the 3GPP standardization body is crucial to leverage the innovations in the telco ecosystem, develop scale, lower costs and favor seamless integration with telco networks. This has tremendous implications, especially for the traditional industry players to catch up with Starlink’s pace of innovation. But this is not free of risks as this will also facilitate the entrance of new players and transform business models. In any case, the opportunity is massive with Analysys Mason forecasting satellite-telco service revenues to climb to $165 billion by 2033 propelled by the development of markets like direct-to-device, connected vehicles, IoT, and rural broadband.

4. Land Mobility and Military Aero Rise to the Top for New Flat Panel Antenna Vendors

Commercial in-flight connectivity (IFC) is an attractive revenue opportunity for high-throughput, low-profile flat panel antennas (FPAs). However, entering this market is a difficult proposition for FPA start-ups given regulatory hurdles, long lead times, narrow range of Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) partners and concentration of new deals to a relatively small number of customers.

Emerging vendors are entering the market through more accessible verticals like land communications-on-the-move (COTM) and defense aircraft. These provide a stepping-stone to validate technology performance and prepare for a subsequent move into IFC. The growing military drone market will support several niches, given the diverse requirements in terms of SWaP, uplink throughput and heat signature.

5. An Inconsistent Impact from Starship

Starship will not unilaterally fix the market’s launch problems, and flights will remain limited and expensive for the next few years. Despite SpaceX’s position, demand will exceed supply. Other market players are not launching enough to impact these problems and are either focused on strategic dedicated launch or new vehicle development.

There is a strong belief that Starship will dramatically reduce global launch market pricing and scheduling challenges. However, SpaceX favors internalized cost savings over price reductions, and Starship’s focus is spread between satellites, people, and large infrastructure. As such, Starship’s impact on the market will not be consistently witnessed or available.

6. The Need for Supply Chain Management for Satellite Manufacturing

Supply chain management should be a more pressing concern in the satellite industry. Demand for satellite constellations remains high, with over 200 currently in development, further increasing need for higher speed and scale of satellite development. However, without strong supply chain management, satellite manufacturing will remain challenged. Investors are demonstrating higher scrutiny of business plans lacking a clear, realistic, and vetted understanding of the technologies required, their timelines, pricing, and availability.

Without an execution plan that includes an audit of required technologies, manufacturers and customers will experience delayed, over-budget, poorly funded missions, ready to be crushed by competition.

7. The Case for Sovereign Access to Space is Clearer than Ever

The war in Ukraine proved once again the absolute criticality of space in conflict zones. But with the unpredictability of Elon Musk and the U.S. administration, Europe (and the rest of the world) realized the need for alternatives, with a clear preference for sovereign solutions.

But the reality in the short term is that Starlink is in a very dominant position. No alternative can match the scale of supply and terminal production cadence of Starlink today. A simulation with Analysys Mason’s NCAT tool shows that Starlink could beam up to 490 times more capacity than OneWeb over Ukraine alone.

In this scenario, programs such as IRIS2 or GOVSATCOM are more important and strategic than ever, but they might be too small and too late. The EU and the SpaceRISE consortium might need to reconsider the scale and the scope of these programs if they want to provide a real alternative.

8. Design for DoD’s Real Needs — Stop Chasing DoD’s Dreams

Another lesson learned from the conflict in Ukraine is that the satellite industry should focus its innovation efforts on meeting DoD’s real needs and stop chasing DoD’s dreams. It is common to see very stringent military requirements that eventually translate into complex and expensive systems. For example, highly sophisticated terminals with SWaP restrictions, EPM modems, etc. But Starlink showed that a cheap terminal, certainly with many limitations compared with what was traditionally conceived as military-grade, can be successful in conflict scenarios like controlling (expendable) drones.

With increasing interest towards commercial satellite services and higher degrees of freedom for system design, system integrators should understand the requirements for each specific use case and deliver solutions where cost and scalability are also critical.

9. Sovereignty and Service Must be the Cornerstone of Earth Observation Vendor Strategy

Geopolitical and efficient-seeking pressures continue to drive governments toward Earth Observation data and services. Commercial vendors are expanding their offerings, adding technology such as GeoAI to boost accuracy and speed of insights. At the same time, vendors are expanding into satellite-as-a-service and hardware offerings to capture a wider addressable market and combine their downstream application and service expertise with satellite procurement and operations. The trend is toward all-in-one offerings, which reduce certain barriers to access, such as time or expertise required.

However, governments are increasingly turning toward sovereign capabilities, seeking independent access and control, which will prove challenging for vendors who either will find themselves closed off from previously accessible markets, or requiring numerous local strategies. Greece’s wildfire detection and the UAE’s SAR constellations highlight this trend, demanding greater global outreach and sovereign focus.

10. Survival Strategies are Necessary in a Disrupted Mobility Market

There is growing optimism around multi-orbit architectures as a path to next-gen mobility connectivity, but real-world deployments remain fragmented due to integration challenges and uneven performance. LEO constellations like Starlink are raising the bar with higher speeds, lower latency, and aggressive pricing, putting pressure on traditional Geostationary Orbit (GEO) and Medium-Earth Orbit (MEO) operators.

Rather than competing on price alone, legacy players are differentiating through value-added services — cybersecurity, IoT platforms, weather/routing tools, and crew/passenger experiences — leveraging strengths in compliance and reliability. Some are adopting multi-orbit bundling and strategic partnerships to stay relevant. But without innovation and pricing agility, defending share in high-growth mobility markets may prove difficult.

Contributions for this piece were gathered from across the Analysys Mason space research team: Christoper Baugh, partner; Lluc Palerm, research director; Dallas Kasaboski, principal analyst; Shagun Sachdeva, senior analyst; Prachi Kawade, senior analyst; Luke Wyles analyst