Canadian satellite operator Telesat says it will have its first pair of Lightspeed low Earth orbiting satellites in orbit by the end of 2026. A total of 96 will then be launched during early 2027 to start a global broadband service. This first pair will test the system and validate the concept. Telesat has booked […]

Telesat has purchased a land plot from the City of Timmins (in Ontario, Canada), which will serve as a landing station to connect data from the advanced Telesat low Earth orbiting Lightspeed satellite network to terrestrial Points of Presence and fibre in Northern Ontario. Construction of the satellite antennas and networking equipment will commence in […]

Canada-based satellite operator Telesat has formally cancelled its plans for an additional 1,671 low Earth orbiting (LEO) satellites. Telesat has already admitted that its important geostationary DTH business is under pressure and is betting its business mainly on a new LEO fleet, called Lightspeed. Lightspeed will comprise about 200 satellites. The now cancelled 1,671 craft […]

The Novaspace World Space Business Week kicked off in Paris but the news for video DTH confirms that the sector is in decline. Telesat’s CEO Dan Goldberg told delegates that people are watching more and more video, but it’s streaming and TikTok. “Unfortunately, they’re not watching so much satellite TV. It has been steady decline, […]

Notwithstanding reports of a further delay to the launch date for AST SpaceMobile’s latest FM1 satellite, the company says it has completed development of the electronics board with its new AST5000 ASIC chip – the cornerstone of the company’s next-generation BlueBird satellites. “After five years of rigorous engineering and production, representing an equivalent of 150+ […]

Telesat Government Solutions, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Telesat, and ALL.SPACE, a specialist in multi-orbit, multi-link SATCOM solutions, have announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to integrate ALL.SPACE user terminals with the Telesat Lightspeed Low Earth Orbit (LEO) network. Telesat Government Solutions will provide detailed Telesat Lightspeed network interface specifications to facilitate the development of ALL.SPACE multi-orbit, […]

Canada’s Telesat satellite operator has seen a rapid decline in revenues from its 14-craft geostationary fleet. In the half-year to June 30th, Telesat’s revenue dropped 27 per cent to C$223 million (€138.9m) as a result of DTH broadcast reductions. For Q2 the decline was even greater at 30 per cent. Two significant clients, EchoStar’s Dish […]

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy didn’t mention Elon Musk’s Starlink, or Eutelsat’s OneWeb, or Canada’s Telesat Lightspeed or any of the ever-growing list of would-be low Earth orbiting (LEO) satellite constellations in remarks on Amazon’s Q2 analysts call. But he did say that Amazon’s Project Kuiper would be one of only two major players in LEO. […]

The CABSAT Dubai show saw Arabsat agreeing a contract with Canadian Telesat for future use of Telesat’s Lightspeed low Earth orbiting (LEO) constellation. The pair signed a Term Sheet in Dubai for a multi-Gb/s capacity pool of Telesat Lightspeed connectivity services. The two companies had previously agreed a Memorandum of Understanding last year. This latest […]

The good news for Canada-based satellite operator Telesat is that its backlog for its Lightspeed mega-constellation is likely to be worth more than C$1.1 billion (€0.7bn) by the end of this year. The bad news is that the first Lightspeed low Earth orbiting satellite will not be orbited until the end of 2026 and service […]