Eutelsat, the third-largest satellite operator in terms of revenue has made a giant leap in its communications constellation with the aid of the giant Elon Musk’s SpaceX. The recent reports confirm that the Frace-based Eutelsat has launched 20 OneWeb satellites in the low-Earth orbit with the help of Elon Musk’s Falcon 9 rocket. These 20 satellites are released with the aim of strengthening Eutelsat’s low Earth orbit broadband network.
In a recent email, Eutelsat spokesperson Katie Dowd confirmed that the company had launched 20 new satellites on October 20, 2024, at 1:13 a.m. The launch took place from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California. With the launch of these 20 satellites, Eutelsat shares that the company now has 654 satellites in its constellation in orbit.
According to the officials, the company already had enough satellites in the low Earth orbit to provide global coverage but was held back due to some good infrastructure delays. Katie Dowd also added that the operator is on track to start Eutelsat’s global services by the beginning of the spring.
The recent 20 satellites from the Eutelsat OneWeb series are identical to the rest of OneWeb’s first-generation constellation. According to reports, Airbus U.S. Space & Defense built these satellites at its mass production facility in Merritt Island, Florida.
These satellites are described as cutting-edge networks that are placed approximately 1,200km above the Earth’s surface. These 654 satellites in the constellation are arranged in 12 orbital phases to provide global coverage. As confirmed by officials these satellites take around 109 minutes to complete one orbit and complete 13 orbits each day.
Although the recent satellites are similar to the older ones in terms of size, they weigh approximately 150kg slightly smaller than the 2015 design of 150-200kg. All these satellites are well equipped and efficient as they can cover a larger area such as Alaska, deliver 7.2 Gbps, and have a usage capacity of 1.1 Tbps. Furthermore, these satellites are capable of adjusting their orbit paths to provide better communication. The solar panels in these satellites help elongate their lifespans of five years.
The most important advantage of these OneWeb satellites is that they reduce latency by staying 30 times closer to the Earth when compared to Geostationary Orbit (GEO) satellites. While GEO systems have a latency of 560ms latency, OneWeb offers a reduced latency of 70ms.
This is one of the most iconic features of OneWeb that helps it enhance live streaming, cloud applications, disaster recovery communications, and voice calls. It also helps OneWeb offer high-speed broadband connectivity and bridge the digital divide in different regions.
With such improvements and advancements in their fields, the CEO of Eutelsat Eva Berneke commented that the recent launches will improve their overall performance by strengthening their networks. So he thanked and congratulated all the Eutelsat team members and expressed his gratitude to SpaceX for supporting them in facilitating the launch.
Along with these advancements, Eutelsat has several other plans such as prolonging the life of Gen 1 to evaluate customer feedback as they are planning to introduce Next Gen. With the upcoming plans, Eutelsat confirms that it aims to compete with Starlink with a more flexible and resilient multi-orbit network, focusing on enterprise and government customers.
