A simulation of the SpaceX, Amazon, Telesat and OneWeb broadband satellite constellations

Over two years ago, an MIT research group ran a simulation of the low-Earth orbit broadband constellations of OneWeb, SpaceX, and Telesat, and last January they repeated the simulation updating with revised constellation characteristics and adding Amazon's Project Kuiper.

They ran the new simulation twice, once using the planned initial deployments of each constellation and a second time using the configuration shown below, which shows final deployments assuming that change requests that were pending in January would be approved. (SpaceX's have been approved). I will discuss the second simulation here and you can consult the paper for the results of the initial deployment simulation.

The following figure shows the total system throughput for each constellation as a function of the number of ground stations and whether or not the satellites have optical inter-satellite links (OISLs) enabling them to route traffic through the in-orbit grid. (The lines show averages and the shaded regions show interquartile values).

Note that Telesat is committed to having OISLs in all their satellites and SpaceX will have them in their polar-orbit version 1.5 satellites that are launching this year and in all version 2 satellites starting next year. OneWeb initially planned to include OISLs but decided not to for now and Amazon has not committed to them but has formed an OISL hardware team.

The following figure shows the number of satellites in line of sight (LoS) at full deployment and population as a function of latitude. All Amazon satellites are in inclined orbits, so, while major population centers are served, polar regions are not and the altitudes of the OneWeb and Telesat constellations increase the numbers of satellites in LoS.

If interested, you should read this and the earlier paper (links in the opening paragraph) for details on the methodology, assumptions, and results, but I will conclude with a couple of caveats.

This simulation ignores the 7,518 very low-Earth orbit satellites that have been approved for SpaceX and the designs of all of the constellations are in flux. SpaceX will soon be launching version 1.5 satellites followed by version 2 next year. Similarly, OneWeb will be launching improved satellites by the time the constellation is complete and Telesat and Amazon are still in the design phase.

The simulation assumes that demand is proportional to population (based on a 0.1-degree resolution grid), so mobile utilization by ships, planes, and vehicles is not considered. It also assumes each individual consumes an average of 300 Kbps and the total addressable market is 10% of the global population. As they admit, the 10% is optimistic. (Elon Musk expects 3-5%). Since SpaceX will be charging the same price in every nation, their per-capita subscription rates will vary with national income, and the companies' target markets vary. For example, Telesat will not market to consumers. 

While the specifics will change and this and other simulations will have to be rerun over time, this simulation considers key variables, and general conclusions can be drawn. For example, in this simulation, maximum throughput is from 13-42% higher when 20 Gbps OISLs are assumed. Currently, only SpaceX and Telesat are committed to OISLs, but since OISL technology is improving and they also improve latency, save on ground station cost and enable coverage at sea and other isolated locations, I expect all operators to eventually adopt them. (We may also see OISLs between layers, for example, between Telesat's LEO and GEO constellations).

SpaceX Starlink vs Telesat Lightspeed

Based on the company’s study of the broadband market’s rise and how to better support it, I guess it’s something we had to do. For us, you have no choice but to land at LEO.
Telesat President and CEO Dan Goldberg (Source)

With 1,675 satellites launched and 500,000 requests for service in the United States alone, SpaceX Starlink clearly leads all would-be providers of low Earth orbit (LEO) internet service to consumers. However, it is arguable that Telesat Lightspeed is in the lead, or contending for the lead with SpaceX, in non-consumer enterprise, government, mobile backhaul, mobility and rural community markets. SpaceX will eventually offer service to non-consumers -- they have already applied for mobile connectivity -- but have focused on consumers from day one.

Telesat is focusing on organizations.

Telesat is an established Geostationary orbit (GEO) Internet service provider, but it became clear that their customers and others were interested in LEO service so they began researching markets, evolving technology, and system design. (Goldberg estimates that about 25% of Telesat’s current GEO business could be served better from satellites in LEO).

Both companies started their LEO projects around the same time. In November 2014 Elon Musk tweeted that SpaceX was "in the early stages of developing advanced micro-satellites operating in large formations" and they launched two test satellites in February 2018. In April 2016, Telesat ordered two prototype satellites, to begin tests for the design of a LEO satellite constellation. LEO Vantage-1 was launched in January 2018 and LEO Vantage-2 was launched in November 2017.

In the interim, SpaceX has made spectacular progress in rocket and launch capability while Telesat focused on LEO system design, conducting tests and demonstrations with their GEO customers and others, working on the DARPA Blackjack constellation, and evaluating potential vendors. This work led them to the decision to ignore the consumer market and that is reflected in the design of their constellation. Let's consider some of the characteristics of the SpaceX and Telesat systems.

Telesat plans to launch 78 polar-orbit satellites at an altitude of 1,015 km and 220 inclined-orbit satellites at 1,325 km while SpaceX's first phase is 4,408 satellites between 540 and 570 km altitude and inclinations from 53 to 97.6 degrees. SpaceX has permission to launch 12,000 satellites and has applied for 30,000 more and Telesat has applied to launch 1,600 more satellites if things go well. The mass of Telesat's satellite will be around 700 kg and SpaceX satellites are around 269 kg. As we see below, Telesat's satellites are larger because they do more -- process inter-satellite and satellite to ground data at high rates, adapt to dynamically changing customer requirements and have multiple thrusters and control systems for deorbiting a failed satellite.

SpaceX is able to launch 60 of their satellites at a time using their current Falcon 9 rocket and that will increase to 400 with the Starship. Telesat plans to launch early satellites on Blue Origin and Relativity Space rockets but is talking with others, including SpaceX, for subsequent launches. Goldberg estimates that a Falcon 9 could launch 15 or 16 satellites to an inclined orbit and “something like 13” to a polar orbit. Those numbers would increase roughly 6 times with a Starship.

Since Telesat satellites will be more expensive to build and launch, they are designing them for a ten-year life compared to five years for SpaceX. SpaceX per-satellite manufacturing and launch costs will be much lower than those of Telesat but it will cost them more to make and launch 12,000 satellites than it will cost Telesat to make and launch 298. That being said, SpaceX will have the opportunity to update their technology more frequently and will have the cost advantage of in-house, high-volume mass production.

SpaceX beta testers in relatively affluent nations are paying $500 for a terminal and a monthly fee of $99 and customers will receive untiered, best-effort service with no data caps. (SpaceX may charge consumers less in poorer nations if they have unused capacity). Most beta testers are reporting download speeds of 50 to 150 Mb/s and latency from 20ms to 40ms with occasional dropouts. Capacity will improve as more satellites are launched but the available capacity will be shared by more users.

Telesat will have far fewer customers but will offer guaranteed service-level contracts with speeds up to 7.5 Gbps to a single terminal or 20 Gbps to a hotspot. They will be able to dynamically configure their service -- for example requiring different performance during the day or night or increasing airport capacity during the holiday travel seasons -- which will require a software-defined network operating system. (At one time. they had agreed to use the operating system Google had developed for Project Loon, but Loon was terminated and the network operating system is being designed by Thales Alenia Space, the prime contractor.

SpaceX and Telesat both plan to have polar-orbit and inclined-orbit planes which will enable global coverage. Telesat has applied for a patent on that architecture. There may something unique about the Telesat design and, if the patent is granted, maybe SpaceX will have to pay royalties.

Telesat's orbits are at higher altitudes than those of SpaceX so their satellites will have larger footprints, hops from one satellite to another will be less frequent and their customers will be farther apart, reducing the likelihood of interference. There will also be less congestion and the likelihood of a collision at the higher altitude but, if a satellite fails and becomes debris, it will take longer to deorbit so Telesat satellites have GPS and Galileo receivers, multiple thrusters and control systems, and grappling hooks for tracking and powered de-orbit if necessary.

SpaceX will be in commercial operation before Telesat, but Telesat has gained cutting-edge experience with their work on the Blackjack constellation and will be able to use later technology. For example, SpaceX initially planned to have five inter-satellite laser links (ISLLs) on each satellite, but the technology was not affordable when they began launching satellites so they had none. (They now have 10 satellites with four ISLLs each in orbit). In the meantime, Telesat worked with Mynaric on the Blackjack constellation and when they finally begin launching their satellites they will each have four ISLLs, improving performance and lowering ground segment cost. (Telesat ISLLs will be full-duplex, capable of ingesting 4 x 10 = 40 Gbps and transmitting 4 x 10 = 40 Gbps simultaneously).

Terminals are another key technology. SpaceX will require millions of consumer terminals. They are estimated to cost $1,500 today, but the cost is expected to fall to a few hundred dollars within a year or two. Still, the total cost of consumer terminals will be substantial and they will have many customers to service. SpaceX has applied for permission to deploy mobile terminals on ships, planes, and trucks. (How long will it be before a Starlink terminal is offered on a Tesla car)? Telesat will have a variety of fixed and mobile terminals when they launch their service and I expect that SpaceX will also by that time.

It looks like neither SpaceX nor Telesat will have trouble financing their first production constellations. Telesat says it will need $5 billion, and it has existing GEO revenue, government support for rural connectivity, revenue from the sale of C-band spectrum and loans, and is planning a public stock offering to complete Lightspeed funding. SpaceX says it will need $10 billion, but it has received five grants and completed 15 funding rounds. The latest funding round, completed in April, valued SpaceX at $74 billion, up from $46 billion in August 2020. SpaceX will also receive a subsidy for rural connectivity and has a profitable launch business and government contracts.

SpaceX is vertically integrated, manufacturing satellites and components like phased-array antennas, ISLLs, and user terminals as well as launching their own satellites. SpaceX will develop most of their system in-house but will partner with Microsoft and Google on the ground segment and also uses LeoLab's satellite tracking service. Telesat is handing marketing and customer relations but will outsource launch service, system integration, satellite design and manufacturing, laser terminals, antennas, the operating system, etc. to others. Perhaps they are considering contracting with Google and/or Microsoft for ground infrastructure and service.

I've singled out SpaceX and Telesat for comparison because they have made significant progress, but they are not the only LEO broadband contenders. OneWeb is also focusing on non-consumers and they will be offering service before Telesat. I imagine Amazon Project Kuiper will also focus on non-consumers since Amazon has been an infrastructure company since it was founded. Finally, with plans for 12,992 satellites, my guess is that China SatNet will serve consumers and non-consumers in China and countries with Belt and Road infrastructure projects. Starlink, Lightspeed, and the others can all succeed if we are able to avoid collisions in LEO.

Update 5/31/2021

Telesat had hoped to earn $300 million from C-band spectrum sales, but looks like the Canadian Government, not Telesat will run the auction for its spectrum and it may or may not compensate Telesat when the sale is held in 2023.

Update 3/24/2022

Supply chain problems and inflationary pressure during delays may cause Telesat to cut the size of its constellation by as much as one hundred satellites or raise more money. Schedules have slipped and they now plan to launch the satellites in 2025 and begin service in 2026 -- three years after close competitor OneWeb hopes to begin service. Might the Canadian government help Telesat if necessary?

Update 5/9/2022

Telesat reported that it reduced the size of its planned LEO satellite constellation, Lightspeed. The company still plans to spend a total of $5 billion on Lightspeed, but now plans to operate a total of 188 satellites instead of 298. They will still offer global connectivity but will have less capacity, which will limit revenue.

That's the bad news. The good news is that they received a $30.65 million contract to demonstrate Ka-band transmission between two Earth observation satellites, between LEO satellites and Telesat-operated satellites flying at a higher altitude (in geostationary orbit), and optical transmission between LEO satellites.

Low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet service developments for 2020

I posted reviews of important LEO-satellite Internet service developments during 2017, 2018 and 2019. I've updated those posts during the years and have 18 new posts for 2020. In 2020 we saw increased effort from China, OneWeb's bankruptcy and restructuring with new ownership and prospects, Amazon investng in space-related infrastructure, Telesat making steady progress, SpaceX making rapid progress and satellite and debris tracking and collision-avoidsnce service startups. The following are brief summaries of and links to the 2020 posts.

China will be a formidable satellite Internet service competitor (Jan 28)

This post describes three planned Chinese constellations, at least one of which will focus on broadband Internet service. Testing has begun and satellite mamufacturing capacity is being developed. They will serve both domestic and international users as part of China's global Digital Silk Road infrastructure program and are funded by both private and government investment.

LEO Broadband Will Create Millions of Jobs (Feb 13)

SpcaceX is recruiting hard-working, trustworthy people with common sense regardless of their education. They will train new-hires. This was commmon practice in the 1960s, when IBM had a formal two-year training program for new hires and the 1950s when the US government paid IBM to hire and train 3,000 programmers for the SAGE early-warning system.

Geely's LEO constellation for mobile vehicle connectivity (Mar 4)

The Geely Holding Group (GHG), a diversified, private Chinese conglomerate that is best known as an auto manufacturer, began construction of an intelligent satellite production and testing facility.

OneWeb is bankrupt -- who will buy their assets? (Mar 31)

OneWeb filed for bankruptcy and partnership of the British government and Bharti Global limited, an Indian telecommunication conglomerate serving parts of Asia and Africa, bid a billion dollars to acquire OneWeb's assets and restart the company.

SpaceX applies for a constellation re-design and announces beta test dates. (Apr 24)

SpaceX applied for a redesign of their constellation. If approved, the number of satellites would essentially be unchanged, but many would be at lower altitude and some will be moved to polar orbits enabling better coverage of far northern and southren latitudes.

Can SpaceX launch 30,000 second-generation Starlink satellites? Maybe. (Jun 8)

SpaceX applied for permission to launch 30,000 "second-generation" Starlink broadband Internet satellites. This post describes the proposed constellation and speculates on their ability to fund, manufacture and launch so many satellites and the feasibility of dealing with the space debris that the effort would create.

Rural broadband subsidy -- what's the rush? (Jun 13)

The Federal Communications Commission adopted procedures for Phase I of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund auction to award up to $16 billion in support over 10 years for the deployment of fixed broadband networks. The post describes the program and questions the categorization of satellite-based services as high-latency and the rush to allocate the funds.

Questions on the impact of trees on SpaceX Starlink (Jun 24)

This post raises a number of questions about the impact of trees and other obstructions as well as rain and snow on SpaceX Starlink service.

Amazon Aerospace and Satellite Solutions -- integrating satellites and terrestrial services (Jul 6)

Amazon announced Amazon Web Services Aerospace and Satellite Solutions to market and assist in the design and implementation of complex space/terrestrial systems. SpaceX has a substantial lead in launch and satellite deployment and Amazon has superior terrestrial resources and is building the organization and infrastructure to connect them to space.

OneWeb rises from the ashes -- maybe (Jul 22)

A consortium of the UK Government and Bharti Enterprises bought bankrupt OneWeb, a company that had raised $3.2 billion and had acquired valuable spectrum rights, for $1 billion. While they lag behind SpaceX and will need more capital, they have a number of advantages and I hope they succeed.

Bill Gates has not forgotten Teledesic (Sep 17)

Gates was a founding investor in Teledesic, the first attempt at LEO satellite Internet connectivity, but it failed. Today, he is a major investor in Kymeta, a leading supplier of electronically-steered antennas and Microsoft tested satellite access to their Azure cloud services. Microsoft does not want to miss out on space connectivity and services.

A new Chinese broadband satellite constellation (Oct 2)

China applied for specturm for a major new LEO satellite constellation with 12,992 satellites, roughly half of which will orbit at around 550 km and half at 1,145 km. SpaceX is off to a fast start and will be first to offer connectivity in America and Europe, OneWeb, through Bharti, has an edge in Asia and Africa and the Chinese companies have the same in Digital Silk Road nations.

SpaceX Starlink is on a roll (Oct 23)

SpaceX entered into a partnership with Microsoft to connect to their Azure cloud, giving them an answer to Project Kuiper's integration with Amazon Web Services and infrastructure. They also began offering beta service to a few individuals and organizations in the northern US and solicited applications for a public beta test and saw such strong demand that they requested an increase in the number of authorized US terminals. They have also registered 14 shell companies in 13 foreign nations and are deploying ground stations in north America and Europe.

SpaceX Starlink beta, phase two (Oct 28)

Starlink opened beta testing to the public. Applicants must be between 42 and 53 degrees north lattitude. The inital locations must be in the US and the price is $99 per month for the service $499 for a terminal.

Satellite and space debris tracking as a service (Nov 6)

LeoLabs and Northstar are offering satellite and debris tracking and collision avoidance as a service. LeoLabs is using terrestrial, phased-array radar and Northstar is tracking from satellites. Tracking and collision avoidance is a technical and political problem because it requires collaboration and data sharing among government and private satellite operators from all nations.

Starlink will be priced to be affordable (Nov 14)

SpaceX and others will have to charge less for connecivity in developing nations if their service is to be affordable and fully use the capacity of the constellation. Charging more in affluent markets will increase revenue and tend to reduce the "digital divide" -- good business and good karma.

OneWeb is out of bankruptcy, but is not out of the woods (Nov 25)

OneWeb has emerged from bankruptcy with Bharti and the UK governmenet having 42.2% ownership each. Some of their previous agreements are in place and some inevestors are still participating. They will have to raise more capital and are well behind SpaceX, but have acquired assets that had cost $3.3 billion and have marketing advantages in several areas. We need competition and I hope they succeed.

Telesat update -- proposal for a larger constellation, Canadian and DARPA contracts, a planned IPO and more (Dec 28) Telesat has submitted a plan calling for an increase in the number of satellites they launch to 1,671. While they have not yet launched production satellites, they have run many tests and demonstrations and have research contracts with the US and Canadian governments, Canadian government support, a steady stream of income from their 50-year old geostationary satellite business, ground stations in the north and plans for an IPO to finance the LEO constellation.

Telesat update -- proposal for a larger constellation, Canadian and DARPA contracts, a planned IPO and more

Telesat has a number of unique advantages and, if LEO broadband truly is a half a trillion-dollar addressable market, there will be room for multiple providers.

Blue satellites are in polar orbits and
red satellites are in inclined orbits.
Click here for animation.

I've discussed Telesat's LEO broadband project in earlier posts, but the project has progressed, so an update is needed.

The original plan was to launch 117 satellites but that has changed. The phase 1 constellation will now have 298 satellites and the second phase will add 1,373 for a total of 1,671. The revised plan has been submitted to the FCC, and they expect it to be approved next year.

While Telesat applied to increase the number of satellites, the macro architecture remains the same as originally planned. There will be two sub-constellations, one with 351 satellites in polar orbits (98.98 degrees/1,015 km) and another with 1,320 in inclined orbits (50.88 degrees/1,325 km). This patented architecture will enable them to serve the entire globe. (I am not a lawyer, but I wonder whether that is something that can be patented).

The sub-constellation architecture will enable global coverage and low latency but will require sophisticated inter-satellite laser links (ISLLs). It turns out that DARPA is also developing Blackjack, a military LEO communication constellation, and since the military requires low-latency and the ability to quickly establish connectivity at arbitrary, perhaps remote locations, they require ISLLs. Telesat received a $2.8 million study contract for the design of the Blackjack bus in 2018 and was awarded $18.3 million to develop and test Blackjack last October. In that role, Telesat selected Mynaric to supply ISLLs and may use them in their satellites as well.

The Canadian government has granted Telesat C$85 million to support research and development and another C$600 million to subsidize Internet connectivity in rural Canada. The R&D funds will go to early satellite tests and will support approximately 500 professional jobs and the rural connectivity funds are like those in the US where SpaceX was awarded $885 million.

While Telesat will have global coverage, they will focus on Canada and the north at first and that will put them in competition with OneWeb which plans to do the same. OneWeb will have a head start since it already has a distribution partner and plans to begin service in the north next fall, but Telesat will need fewer ground stations because of it's ISLLs and it already has 10 GEO teleports in North America and two others in Hawaii and Austria.

Telesat has run tests and done demonstrations of many potential applications since launching a test satellite in 2018 and Lynette Simmons, Director of Marketing and Communication, says the system design is complete and they expect to announce the prime contractor very soon. They will finance the constellation by restructuring and a public stock offering. President and CEO Dan Goldberg is confident that they will be able to raise sufficient capital based on their track record. The company is over 50 years old and is a large, global GEO satellite operator that has been broadcasting televiion since 1978, providing Internet connectivity since 1996 and they have been doing advanced research for both the US and Canadian governments. Goldberg thinks LEO broadband is a half a trillion-dollar market and you can see his pitch in the following video.

Let me add a little speculation. Nearly two years ago, Telesat signed an agreement to use the software defined network (SDN) platform Google had developed for Project Loon, which provides connectivity using baloons in the stratosphere. If Telesat's system design includes Google's SDN, Telesat LEO satellites may be able to interoperate with Google's baloons. Going a step further, they may one day interoperate with Telesat's GEO satellites, creating an integrated three-layer network routing packets between as well as within layers depending upon the service level required by a customer or application. An integrated network could also provide fallback in the case of equipment failure.

A reader recently commented on my Twitter feed that Telesat was "moot," because SpaceX has superior launch capability and a head start, and OneWeb, which, like Telesat, is forsaking the consumer market for commercial applications like 5G backhaul, is a direct competitor. He was wrong. Telesat has a number of unique advantages and, if LEO broadband turns out to be anywhere near the half-trillion-dollar addressable market Goldberg expects, there will be room for multiple providers.

Updates 12/28/2020

A reader pointed out that Telesate has also committed to investing the revenue from their sale of C-band spectrum in the LEO constellation. That spectrum will be used for 5G mobile connectivity and will enlarge the prospective mobile-backhaul market.

Speading at a webinar on "Building NewSpace," Michel Forest, Telsat Director of LEO Systems Engineering says there is significant demand for LEO among their current GEO customers who want low latency and more capacity in specific places like airline hubs and ports. (33:37)

For a threaded discussion of this post on Reddit, click here.

Update 2/23/2021

Telesat received $344 million for their share of the C-band auction and C$400 million from Quebec (C$200 grant and C$200 loan) for economic development.

Low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet service developments for 2019

SpaceX lands two boosters (video)

I posted reviews of important LEO-satellite Internet service developments during 2017 and 2018. I've been updating those posts during the years and have 16 new posts for 2019. In 2019 we saw four inciteful simulations, Leosat suspending operations and Amazon announcing the availability of a new ground station service and plans for a LEO constellation, progress in phased-array antennas but a lowering of expectations for inter-satellite laser links (ISLLs), new competition from China, worries about space debris and SpaceX racing ahead of the pack. The following are brief summaries of and links to those 2019 posts:

Simulation of OneWeb, SpaceX and Telesat's proposed global broadband constellations (January 2019)

Inigo del Portillo and his colleagues at MIT have run a simulation comparing OneWeb, SpaceX and Telesat's proposed LEO Internet service constellations. They estimated the average data rate per satellite and total system throughput (sellable capacity) for each constellation then computed the number of ground stations needed to achieve full capacity. The simulations were run with and without ISLLs. The configurations of SpaceX and OneWeb's constellations have changed somewhat since they ran the simulations, but del Portillo does not think the numbers for total throughput and number of ground stations would vary a lot for SpaceX and he expected the total system throughput would decrease slightly for OneWeb because of the reduction of the number of satellites from the initial 720 to 600.

Fifteen-dollar, electronically-steerable antennas for satellite and terrestrial connectivity (February 2019)

OneWeb founder Greg Wyler announced that his self-funded side project, Wafer LLC, has developed a flat, low-power phased-array antenna that could be mass-produced for $15. If that is the case, we can look forward to end-user terminals in the $2-300 dollar range. At this cost, one can envision deploying large numbers of two-antenna user terminals to act as ground stations when they are otherwise idle. A recent simulation shows that doing so would result in lower latency and jitter than today's terrestrial networks. Owners of these relay terminals could be subsidized.

Google balloons and Telesat satellites (February 2019)

Telesat will use Google's network operating system. In return, Google, which is also a SpaceX investor, may get access to some Telesat data in addition to compensation for their software. Another intriguing possibility is that Google might be planning to integrate Project Loon, their stratospheric balloon Internet service with Telesat's LEO satellite Internet service -- to use Telesat's network as a global backbone. That integration would be facilitated by their both running the same SDN software -- the same network operating system. (In the long run, I expect that all network layers will be integrated -- from the ground to airplanes to geostationary orbit).

SpaceX's Starlink Internet service will target end-users on day one (March 2019)

Starting with Teledesic in 1990, would-be LEO satellite constellations have pitched their projects to the FCC, other regulators, and the public as a means of closing the digital divide, but they also have their eyes on lucrative aviation, maritime, high-speed trading, mobile backhaul, enterprise, and governments markets. (LEOSat, which had planned to focus exclusively on the enterprise and government markets recently suspended operations). SpaceX has filed an FCC application for one million ground stations, indicating that they will be focused on end-users and small organizations in addition to high-end customers from the start.

Are inter-satellite laser links a bug or a feature of ISP constellations? (April 2019)

OneWeb has decided not to include ISLLs in the first phase of their constellation and SpaceX will not introduce them until near the end of 2020, at which time they may start with test satellites. OneWeb's decision was motivated by political issues in Russia as well as technical considerations. They will need more ground stations to offer global service without ISLLs and a team of MIT researchers has run a simulation of a 720-satellite OnWeb constellation. They estimate that 71 ground stations would be required to reach maximum throughput.

Amazon's orbiting infrastructure (April 2019)

In his first annual stockholder letter, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos stressed that Amazon was focused on investing in infrastructure. Initially, they invested in retail distribution centers but have added an Internet backbone, trucks and planes, third party retail support, cloud computing and storage, and satellite launch and ground station service and are now working on a constellation of LEO satellites for broadband service. They use this infrastructure themselves and market it to competitors like online retailers and they have contracts to launch satellites for OneWeb and Telesat. This infrastructure yields both revenue and access to market data and there have been calls for antitrust action against Amazon.

Satellite Internet Service Progress by SpaceX and Telesat (May 2019)

Telesat has signed their first LEO customer, Omniaccess a provider of connectivity to the superyacht market, received a subsidy from the Canadian budget for providing service in rural Canada, is working with two teams that are competing to be the prime contractor for their constellation, and signed a launch contract with Amazon's Blue Origen. They also announced that they had demonstrated 5G mobile backhaul in tests with Vodaphone and the University of Surrey. SpaceX also announced ambitious plans for future launches, which have subsequently been surpassed.

SpaceX reports significant broadband satellite progress (May 2019)

SpaceX announced a significant reduction in the size and weight of their satellites and the addition of krypton-powered thrusters that would enable them to autonomously avoid collisions with on-orbit debris that was large enough to track. The thrusters would also be used to de-orbit obsolete satellites. Might the collective constellation "learn" to avoid smaller debris one day?

Might satellite constellations learn to avoid debris with sensors on satellites? (May 2019)

According to the European Space Agency, there are about 5,000 orbiting satellites, about 40% of which are still functioning. They estimate that there have been over 500 break-ups, explosions, collisions, or anomalous events resulting in fragmentation and they estimate that there are 34,000 debris objects >10 cm, 900,000 from 1 to 10 cm and 128 million from 1 mm to 1 cm. NASA says there are more than 20,000 pieces of debris larger than a softball, 500,000 the size of a marble or larger and many millions so small they can’t be tracked. Space debris is a "tragedy of the commons." SpaceX plans to launch thousands of satellites. Could sensors on satellites detect and catalog small pieces of debris and, if so, could that lead to meaningful evasive action?

Hongyun Project -- China's low-earth orbit broadband Internet project (June 2019)

China has announced two LEO broadband satellite projects and a LEO narrowband Internet of things constellation. While far behind SpaceX in technology, the Chinese companies have a large domestic market, access to government capital and political and economic ties to many nations through their Belt and Road and Digital Silk Road infrastructure projects.

Amazon's AWS Ground Station service is now available (June 2019)

Amazon is offering satellite ground station access as a service. They list a number of advantages to their service, several of which are based on complementary Amazon offerings like access to their data centers and global network backbone and cloud computing and storage services. We can assume that Amazon's satellite constellation will use these ground stations at cost and, like their launch service, they will be made available to competitors. Amazon has been accused of predatory pricing in retail and competing ground-segment companies may fear the same.

Latecomer Amazon will be a formidable satellite ISP competitor (July 2019)

In spite of being a latecomer to the race to deploy a constellation of LEO broadband Internet satellites, Amazon's Project Kuiper will be a formidable competitor. While far behind SpaceX, Amazon has in-house launch capability and they have extensive complementary infrastructure including data centers, Web services, and a ground-station service. They also have the funds to finance the constellation as well as to develop or acquire critical technology like ISLLs and cost-effective phased-array antennas. They have also hired ex-SpaceX executives and engineers and in Jeff Bezos they have a leader who is comparable to Elon Musk.

An optimistic update from Telesat (August 2019)

Telesat received 685 million Canadian dollars from the government to subsidize rural connectivity. They plan to start service at the end of 2022 with 200 satellites in polar orbit, to add 100 more in inclined orbit in 2023 and perhaps eventually reach 500 satellites. Combining polar and inclined orbits and utilizing the far-north ground stations they already have for their profitable, established geosynchronous satellite service will help them gain a foothold in rural Canada and polar regions.

Inter-satellite laser link update (November 2019)

SpaceX initially planned to have five ISLLs per satellite but cut that back to four due to the technical difficulty of linking to a fast-moving satellite in a crossing plane and the short duration of such links. OneWeb has decided against using ISLLs for the time being due to cost and political considerations and Telesat remains committed to them. SpaceX is engineering its own ISLL hardware, but OneWeb and Telesat may be working with third parties. The situation with Hongyun is unknown and LEOsat has abandoned their effort.

What to expect from SpaceX Starlink broadband service next year and beyond (November 2019)

By the end of 2020, SpaceX will have coverage in the heavily populated parts of the world between around 50 degrees north and south latitude. They expect to be launching 120 satellites a month and, by the end of 2020, the satellites will be equipped with ISLLs. However, by that time they will have many legacy satellites in space and those early ISLLs may just be for testing. They expect the next-generation Starship to be able to place at least 400 Starlink satellites in orbit, reducing the per-satellite cost to 20% of today's 60-satellite launches. They hope to compete with the "crappy" $80/month service in the US and, since the cost of the constellation is fixed, they will strive for affordable prices worldwide.

Starlink simulation shows low latency without inter-satellite laser links (ISSLa) (December 2019)

Mark Handley, a professor at University College London, has made two terrific videos based on runs of his simulation of the first -- 1,584 satellite -- phase of SpaceX Starlink. I discussed the first video, which assumes that the satellites have ISLLs, in a recent post. This one shows that, while not as fast as an equivalent ISLL path, long bent-pipe paths would typically have lower latency than terrestrial fiber routes between the same two points. It also considers the possibility of using end-user terminals as ground stations when they are idle, which would further reduce latency and jitter.




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An optimistic update from Telesat

Once the 100 inclined-orbit satellites are in orbit, they may be able to utilize their inter-satellite laser links to achieve the 30 ms latency Goldman spoke of.

Polar (green) and inclined (red) orbits

Emily Jackson interviewed Dan Goldberg, Telesat President and CEO, in a recent episode of the Down to Business podcast. The interview followed the announcement that the Canadian Government would contribute $85 million (all amounts are in Canadian dollars) to support research and development in support of Telesat's planned constellation of low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites and another $600 million to subsidize Internet connectivity in rural Canada.

Goldberg pointed out that all governments subsidize rural connectivity and said the $600 million grant was expected to generate $600 million in revenue from below-market-rate sales to telephone companies and ISPs. The remaining capacity would be sold to others and he said they anticipated sales to enterprises, governments, ships, and airlines, but did not mention marketing directly to consumers. (Only SpaceX seems to be targeting consumers from the start).

In return for the R&D contribution, Telesat has agreed to support approximately 500 professional jobs in Canada and invest $215 million in R&D. (That R&D includes the first dozen or so test satellites). Telesat has a profitable, established geostationary satellite business and will fund part of the constellation themselves, but they will also need debt and equity financing and Goldberg said this government support would make it easier for them to finance the constellation.

This financial news is important, but Goldberg's optimism about the technology is what caught my attention. They have been working on their LEO project for six years and during that time the cost of launching satellites -- geostationary as well as LEO -- has fallen dramatically and he expects it to continue to do so. He also predicted that the cost of mass-produced satellites will fall dramatically and he is confident that inter-satellite laser links (ISLLs) and electronically-steerable phased-array antennas will be cheap enough to allow them to compete successfully with terrestrial fiber and 5G, offering fast, 30 ms latency broadband. (ISLLs present both technological and political problems).

The only technological concern he expressed was with regard to the problem of radio interference. He did not say anything specific on these technologies but did point out that Telesat has been providing satellite service for 50 years and is the "leading satellite technical consultant" in the world. (Three percent of their revenue is from consulting).

Goldberg summed up his optimism by saying:

Our confidence level in terms of our ability to bring this disruptive capability to the market and provide an extraordinarily high-quality, disruptive broadband service to Canadians and also to everybody else living in the world is extraordinarily high. This is not some high, big-gamble, futuristic new technology. This technology will be disruptive but it is ready for prime time.

Yes, but ...

SpaceX simulation with uncovered areas

Goldberg said they could could achieve global coverage with only 72 satellites and a simulation by Mark Handley predicts that SpaceX will not completely cover the planet with 792 satellites. How do we explain the difference?

SpaceX with 792 satellites would have much more capacity than Telesat with 72 satellites and Telesat does not plan to offer service with only 72 satellites. They plan to start service at the end of 2022 with around 200 satellites in polar orbit. They will add 100 more in inclined orbit in 2023 and perhaps eventually reach 500 satellites. Those 200 polar-orbit satellites will serve the polar regions, fulfilling their promise to provide connectivity in rural Canada. (This is reminiscent of China's Hongyun LEO satellite project which will focus on rural China).

While the 200 polar orbit satellites will provide coverage in rural Canada, they will be partially reliant upon terrestrial ground stations to reach the entire globe and therefore latency will suffer and they already have two far-north ground stations in support of their established, profitable geosynchronous satellite business. Furthermore, in 2016 Telesat filed for a patent on a "Dual LEO Satellite System and Method for Global Coverage" and once the 100 inclined-orbit satellites are in orbit, they may be able to utilize their inter-satellite laser links to achieve the 30 ms latency Goldman spoke of.

Satellite Internet Service Progress by SpaceX and Telesat

This has been a busy week in the race to deploy constellations of low-earth orbit (LEO) Internet-service satellites.

Telesat LEO-1, artist's conception.
Credit SSTL.

In their quarterly report, Telesat mentioned progress in two, disparate markets. As I noted earlier, they have signed their first LEO customer -- Omniaccess a provider of connectivity to the superyacht market. Telesat is a Canadian firm and the quarterly report also said Canada's 2019 Federal budget included a commitment to using LEO satellite services to help bridge the digital divide. They will be serving Russian oligarchs and rural Canadians.

Telesat also announced that the two teams they contracted with to develop overall satellite and ground system proposals, Airbus and a consortium of Thales Alenia Space and Maxar Technologies, had significantly advanced their detailed designs for the complete system, having completed the system definition and risk management phase of the program. Telesat will continue their collaboration with both teams and will select a prime contractor later this year.

Telesat's coolest development was the announcement that they had demonstrated 5G mobile backhaul. They collaborated with Vodaphone and the University of Surrey in a test of their experimental satellites and recorded round trip latency of 18-40 milliseconds. The demonstration supported video chatting, Web browsing and simultaneous streaming of up to 8K video. The team also transferred 4K video to the edge of the 5G network. SES is already providing mobile backhaul using their middle-earth orbit satellites and it seems that the new LEO constellations will be competing with them. This will be an important application for rural areas and developing nations.

Telesat has signed launch contracts with Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin and they plan to be operational by 2022. (Bezos will also be a Telesat competitor, but his LEO project has just been announced).

SpaceX also made the news. SpaceX president and chief operating officer, Gwynne Shotwell, confirmed that the launch scheduled for May 15 will include "dozens" of Starlink Internet-service satellites.

She characterized these as "demonstration" satellites and said they would not include satellite-to-satellite laser communication links. Bulent Altan, CEO of satellite laser company Mynaric, estimates that their laser terminals will cost around 250,000 euros in quantities of 1,000. SpaceX will have 4 in each satellite and they plan to start offering broadband service once they have 800 satellites in orbit -- in the 2020-2021 time frame.

OneWeb will forego inter-satellite optical links in their initial constellation, but they seem to be making steady progress in antennas for satellite-to-ground communication. Both are key technologies for LEO satellite Internet service.

Shotwell said that depending on how the demonstrations proceed, from two to six Starlink launches could follow by the end of this year. In the past, they referred to these as "operational" satellites. Maybe the switch to "demonstration" means they will use them as a marketing tool and the number of launches later in the year will be determined by sales.

Update 5/11/2019

TMF Associates suggests that the FCC may be favoring SpaceX Starlink and that the upcoming launch may carry as many as 40-50 satellites. The post also suggests that they may be launching so many satellites in order to generate publicity to spur further investment which has been difficult during the past year.

Are inter-satellite laser links a bug or a feature of ISP constellations?

I hope each of these companies has someone in charge of thinking about what might go wrong with a single, satellite-based network providing fast, low-cost links anywhere on the global Internet.

Inter-satellite laser links (source)

OneWeb, SpaceX, Telesat and Leosat all aspire to be global Internet service providers using constellations of low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites. Their success will require still-unproven technological innovation, but there are also political stumbling blocks.

OneWeb has already encountered significant political problems in Russia. Russia launched OneWeb's first test satellites and has a billion dollar contract for 20 additional launches, but Russian security officials are lobbying against OneWeb's offering service on the grounds that it might facilitate spying. When Anatoly Zak, an expert on the Soviet space program, investigated that claim, he concluded that "With the launch of the OneWeb constellation, the Russian rocket industry stands to earn millions, but the Kremlin is terrified at the prospect of unhindered access to the Internet by its citizens."

As far as I know, OneWeb is still planning to offer service in Russia, but they have had to make financial and technical concessions. They agreed to become a minority partner in the company that will market their service in Russia and, significantly, they agreed to drop the inter-satellite laser links (ISLLs) from their constellation and pass all Russian traffic through ground stations in Russia.

Dropping ISLLs, which are still unproven for this application, will simplify the design of their satellites and save development time and cost. It will also reduce satellite complexity, size, and weight and save power, but there will be costs.

OneWeb throughput simulation (source)

They will need more ground stations if they offer global service without ISSLLs. OneWeb founder Greg Wyler says they will have more than 40 such gateways, each capable of “seeing” satellites up to 4,000 kilometers away. A team of MIT researchers ran a simulation of a 720-satellite OnWeb constellation and they estimate that 71 ground stations would be required to reach maximum throughput. (Anatoly Zak estimates that four to six gateways will be in Russia and speculates that hackers may be able to illegally connect to satellites in neighboring countries). Dropping ISLLs will also add latency, especially on long-distance links.

What about the other would-be global LEO projects?

Telesat will retain ISSLs, but accommodate countries on a country-by-country basis. Erwin Hudson, vice president of Telesat LEO, says we "have the flexibility in our network control system to route traffic all kinds of different ways. There are no rules that traffic has to go over the inter-satellite links."

SpaceX is going forward with ISSLs, and they are also aware of the political problems. During a recruiting talk at the opening of their Seattle satellite-design office four years ago, CEO Elon Musk said "I'm hopeful that we can structure agreements with various countries to allow communication but it is a country-by-country basis ... it's not gonna take longer than five years to do that and not all countries will agree at first ... that's fine."

Leosat is also prepared to build gateways to make accommodations. For example, CEO Mark Rigolle says they would be willing to build a gateway in China to accommodate the government; however, that would be inconsistent with their primary marketing focus of providing low-latency, secure, point-to-point links globally.

These companies are all thinking about concessions they need to make in order to operate in countries that want to surveil citizens and control their access to information, but what about guarding against aggression? I hope each of these companies has someone in charge of thinking about what might go wrong with a single, satellite-based network providing fast, low-cost links anywhere on the global Internet.

During the recruiting talk mentioned above, Elon Musk said "[the constellation design] is a really difficult technical problem to solve so that's why we need the smartest engineering talent around the world to solve the problem and, you know, to also make sure we don't create Skynet." At that time, I asked "Would global Internet service providers require unique regulation and, if so, what should it be and who has the power to do it?" and said I was "less worried about Musk creating SkyNet than creating Comcast on Steroids," but I was naive.

Follow these links for background on the four projects: SpaceX, OneWeb, Telesat and Leosat.

Update 1/13/2020

OneWeb hopes to establish three ground stations in China. They have signed a "framework agreement" for one in Sanya, a city in southern China, and hope to have that and two others approved. They are also seeking partners to market and support their service. They plan a total of 45 global ground stations.

SpaceX's Starlink Internet service will target end-users on day one

It sounds like SpaceX is planning on offering broadband service to end-users who will order the service online and set up their own ground stations.

Internet users per 100 inhabitants (source)

Starting with Teledesic in 1990, would-be Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite constellations have been justified to the FCC, other regulators, and the public as a means of closing the digital divide. Teledesic's goal was "providing affordable access to advanced network connections to all those parts of the world that will never get such advanced capabilities through existing technologies." Today's low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite companies make the same claim, but Telesat, OneWeb and Leosat seem to be targeting commercial markets first.

As far as I know, Telesat is the first LEO provider to sign up a customer and that customer is Omniaccess. Headquartered in the “yachting capital of the Mediterranean,” Palma de Mallorca, OmniAccess provides broadband and IPTV service to over 350 vessels -- superyachts, boutique cruise lines, and prestigious research & exploration organizations. The Telesat agreement provides OmniAccess with limited exclusivity to serve the "superyacht" market -- in other words, they will be connecting the yachts of Russian oligarchs.

In 2003, OneWeb founder Greg Wyler worked on 3G mobile and fiber access to homes and schools in Rwanda. In 2007, he founded O3b Networks, a middle-Earth orbit satellite Internet service provider to connect the "other three billion" unconnected people. OneWeb was founded in 2012 with goals of 1 billion subscribers by 2025 and the elimination of the global digital divide by 2027. Their first marketing-oriented move was to partner with Airbus, Delta, Sprint, and Airtel, establishing the Strategic Air Alliance to develop standards to enable them to provide passengers seamless, in-cabin connectivity. It looks like their first customers will be airline passengers, ships at sea and mobile phone companies.

Leosat has focused on enterprise and government customers from the start.

Elon Musk followed a similar strategy in bootstrapping his electric car company, Tesla. He started with expensive, high-end vehicles and followed several years later with the lower-priced Models 3 and Y, but it looks like the SpaceX Starlink Internet service will focus on end-users from the start.

SpaceX sister company, SpaceX Services, filed an FCC application for "a blanket license authorizing operation of up to 1,000,000 earth stations that end-user customers will utilize to communicate with SpaceX’s LEO constellation." Those end-users will be individuals, libraries, schools, etc. "throughout the contiguous United States, Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands." They assert that this license will "enable SpaceX to bring high-speed, reliable, and affordable broadband service to consumers in the United States and around the world, including areas underserved or currently unserved by existing networks.” (Note that these initial satellites would have the capacity to serve Cuba and other Caribbean nations).

Their user terminals will "employ advanced phased-array beam-forming and digital processing technologies to make highly efficient use of Ku-band spectrum resources by supporting highly directive steered antenna beams that track the system’s LEO satellites." Since SpaceX plans to begin launching operational satellites in 2019 and they are already conducting successful satellite-ground communication tests, they must be confident that they can mass-produce such antennas at a low cost. (Note that a former SpaceX executive has recently joined Mynaric, a German laser communications startup focused on satellite and airborne platforms. Perhaps SpaceX and Mynaric will collaborate on the antennas).

Ground stations that can track fast-moving satellites, switching seamlessly from one to another when they go out of view, will be easy for end-users to install. It sounds like SpaceX is planning on offering broadband service to end-users who will order the service online and set up their own ground stations.

Click for more on the SpaceX, OneWeb, Telesat and Leosat LEO Internet-service projects.

Update 3/20/2020

SpaceX has received FCC permission to deploy 1,000,000 terminals. The diameter of the terminals will be .49 meters and Elon Musk says they will resemble OFOs on a stick and self-installation will be simple:

Google balloons and Telesat satellites

Telesat will use Google's network operating system. Will Google get access to data? A global backbone?

Loon balloons float at an altitude of around 20 km -- above
birds and the weather. They navigate by moving up or
down to catch wind currents moving in different directions. 

Telesat is making progress. Within the last month, they announced a launch contract with Blue Origin, a successful antenna test with Ball Aerospace and completion of system requirements reviews, but perhaps more interesting is an agreement to use the software defined network (SDN) platform Google has developed for their Project Loon.

Google has been interested in connectivity for underserved areas for many years, and have investigated and invested in non-terrestrial solutions using satellites, blimps, drones and balloons. Project Loon uses constellations of balloons in the stratosphere. They began working on it in 2011, provided emergency connectivity in Peru in 2016 and Puerto Rico in 2017 and are slated to begin commercial deployment in Kenya later this year.

Like LEO satellites, Loon balloons are in constant motion relative to the Earth and each other and the Loon SDN "schedules, predicts, controls and optimizes the wireless topology, radio resources, and routing of packets across the ground and aerospace segments of non-geostationary networks." The satellites and balloons are at different altitudes and move at different speeds, but the network characteristics are similar and Google will adapt their SDN for Telesat's satellite constellation.

Nothing was said about the terms of the deal. Since Google is also an investor in SpaceX, they now have an interest in two of the three large LEO satellite Internet-service projects. In addition to being paid to develop and maintain Telesat's SDN and getting a return on their SpaceX investment, they might be getting access to the data flowing through the networks or to a global backbone.

Softbank invested a billion dollars in OneWeb's satellite-Internet project for access to data. Softbank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son outlined his vision of the future in the keynote session of the 2017 SoftBank World conference. He believes the information revolution will be driven by strong, general artificial intelligence (AI), therefore the key material asset for the information age will be AI training data. His conclusion is "whoever gets the most data wins." Google uses data for AI training and for advertising.

Another intriguing possibility is that Google and Telesat might be planning to integrate their balloon and satellite networks. One can imagine Project Loon using Telesat's satellite network as a global backbone. That integration would be facilitated by their both running the same SDN software -- the same network operating system.

Whatever the motivation, this partnership provides Telesat with a strategic software asset and Google may gain access to data and a fast, global backbone.

For progress reports on the three LEO broadband projects, see OneWeb, Telesat and SpaceX.

Check this short Project Loon video:

Update 6/5/2020

9to5 Google found an interesting Google Careers listing for a “Partner Manager” whose role to “help launch a global satellite-based broadband service.” The partner will "support satellite broadband service providers, productize the solution and make it available to other satellite broadband ISPs.”

The ad does not specify which broadband ISPs the applicant is expected to support, but it could be SpaceX, where Google is an investor, Telesat, a network operating system customer, or both or others. One way or the other Google will win if LEO satellite broadband is a success. Amazon will win too.

Simulation of OneWeb, SpaceX and Telesat's proposed global broadband constellations

Inigo del Portillo and his colleagues at MIT have run a simulation comparing OneWeb, SpaceX and Telesat's proposed low-Earth orbit Internet service constellations. The models are based on the initial FCC filings by the companies and demand and data-rate estimates by the authors. (I will mention subsequent amendments to the filings below).

The first part of the paper presents an overview of the satellites and constellations and simulations predicting the average number of satellites within line of sight at different latitudes:

Source

With 4,425 simulated satellites, SpaceX is the clear leader in all but the extreme north and south, but Telesat, with only 117 satellites, averages more visible satellites than OneWeb with 720 because their minimum elevation angle is 20 degrees while OneWeb's is 55 degrees (SpaceX's is 40 degrees).

Note that SpaceX coverage peaks around the latitude of Seattle, where their center for satellite operations is located, and many large trading and financial cities have 30 or more visible satellites:

Source

They also simulated alternative ground segment configurations. The following figures show throughput as a function of the number of ground stations and assumed optical inter-satellite link (OISL) speed:

Source

They estimated the average data rate per satellite and total system throughput (sellable capacity) for each constellation then computed the number of ground stations needed to achieve full capacity:

	SpaceX	OneWeb	Telesat
Average data rate per satellite (Gbps)	5.36	2.17	22.74
Total system throughput (sellable capacity, Tbps)	23.70	1.56	2.66
Ground stations needed to achieve full capacity	123	71	42
Throughput with 50 ground stations (Tbps)	16.80	1.47	2.66

Note that marginal improvement diminishes as the number of ground stations increases. For example, with 50 ground stations each, the throughputs are SpaceX 16.8, OneWeb 1.47 and Telesat 2.66 Tbps.

Since SpaceX has their own launch capability, they can afford to begin at very large scale, giving them a significant capacity advantage, but Telesat has a significant lead in capacity per satellite. Putting these constellation capacities in context, Telegeography reported that global International bandwidth in 2018 was 393 Tbps, two-thirds of which has been deployed since 2014. Satellite constellations with OISLs will add to that total and provide lower latency times than international terrestrial cables.

As mentioned above, there have been some changes in plans since the FCC filings upon which these simulations were based. OneWeb has reduced the number of satellites in their constellation to 600 and eliminated ISOLs and SpaceX has lowered the altitude of their constellation from 1,100 to 550 km and cut the number of ISOLs per satellite from 5 to 4. (SpaceX was also authorized to use V-band spectrum, but that may be for their planned VLEO constellation).

I asked del Portillo whether they had rerun the simulations using the revised plans, and he said they had not, but he did not think that the numbers for total throughput and number of ground stations would vary a lot for SpaceX and he expected the total system throughput would decrease slightly for OneWeb because of the reduced number of satellites. He also expressed concern about OneWeb being able to provide continuous coverage near the equator where there might be coverage gaps or lower data-rates. (Note that the simulation focused on end-user and backhaul demand, not marine and in-flight connectivity which are priority markets for OneWeb).

SpaceX appears to have financing in place to cover their initial launches and achieve high capacity early and Telesat is making a much smaller initial investment, but should be able to scale up as demand increases. Based on this simulation and problems they have encountered with their Russian partners, OneWeb may be falling behind.

I've summarized some of the results of these simulations, but you should read the paper for details on the model structure, assumptions and a discussion of technical challenges. You can also check out this slide presentation on the paper. I also recommend an earlier paper and accompanying videos on a simulation that predicts routing redundancy and latency with SpaceX's planned broadband constellation.

Update 1/13/2020

Click here to access a subsequent journal article based on this research.