History was made the moment the SpaceX ‘mechazilla’ mechanical arms grabbed the returning Super Heavy Starship booster. Even Elon Musk hadn’t wholly expected this level of success for his rocket programme. The Starship’s upper stage continued on its orbital flight to a soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean and sufficiently on target for the landing […]

A report in The Irish Times details further financial problems faced by Declan Ganley, CEO at Rivada Space Networks. Ganley was warned last week by Judge Jeffifer Schecter in the New York Supreme Court that he was already in contempt of court over non-payments of $20,000 (€18,300) per month to a Rivada shareholder, David Shuman. […]

Eutelsat’s OneWeb and Reliance Jio’s satellite division have moved a step closer to starting their satellite services thanks to India’s Department of Telecommunications having issued provisional licences to the two businesses. The licences have been issued because OneWeb and Jio have already been granted authorisation to operate by India’s In-Space. However, there are strings attached. […]

Up until now it is Elon Musk’s SpaceX that has added snappy names to its floating landing vessels. Musk’s fleet is named ‘Just Read the Instructions’, ‘A Shortfall of Gravitas’ and ‘Of Course I Still Love You’. Now The Jeff Bezos-backed Blue Origin rocket business is getting into the act. For example, Blue Origin’s New […]

Analysts at investment business Sanford C Bernstein are less than optimistic about Jeff Bezos and Amazon’s Project Kuiper broadband-by-satellite scheme. The launch dates for some of the first batches of satellites have slipped from Q4 this year to Q1 2025, but there’s more negative opinion now emerging. Sanford analyst Mark Shmulik has previously been overall […]

Satellite communications specialist Viasat has unveiled a variety of enhancements to its satellite network and service model that it says will raise the bar for business aviation in-flight connectivity. Viasat’s Jet ConneX customers will be the first to benefit from major performance improvements on selected plans, with the introduction of features such as uncapped speeds, […]

SpaceX’s Starlink ‘Direct-to-Cellular’ (D2C) telephony system is being tested in New Zealand. Ben Longmier, SpaceX’s Senior director, satellite engineering, has confirmed the activity, saying the trials are being conducted with its local telco partner, One New Zealand, which has some 2.4 million customers and is the nation’s largest 5G cellular operator. New Zealand is thus […]

It seems, despite much confusion and the departure of Thierry Breton, the EC Commissioner with oversight of the scheme, a Plan B contract for the IRIS2 (Infrastructure for Resilience, Interconnectivity and Security by Satellite) highly secure mega-constellation could be signed by the end of this year. The reformed and much stripped-down consortium (comprising SES, Eutelsat […]

UK telecom regulator Ofcom has published in its consultation documentation that Amazon’s proposed constellation of broadband satellites (‘Project Kuiper’) is developing technical solutions for Direct-to-Device (D2D) cellular connectivity. The Ofcom consultation document is designed to assess future spectrum demand. Ofcom, in its consultation questionnaire, asked whether Kuiper “had an interest in offering D2D services or […]

SpaceX’s Starlink broadband system is testing its direct-to-cellular (D2C) satellite phone system in Romania, designed to show that Starlink satellites can operate at up to eight times the capacity currently allowed by the ITU’s EPFD (Equivalent Power Flux Density) limits, while still protecting geostationary satellites. Starlink’s D2C proposals are highly controversial, and many terrestrial cellular […]