Oneweb is raising $500 million to build 900 satellites for global internet access via low Earth orbit broadband by 2019. Airbus will build the satellites, with 65 launches including some from Virgin Galactic and Arianespace rockets. The Project Mustang partnership aims to provide worldwide IoT coverage combining satellite links using a small dedicated terminal communicating through 868/915MHz bands to SIGFOX's terrestrial network. Terran Orbital is launching small satellites at 600km to provide cheap data connections for battery-powered sensors, having applications for disaster relief, agriculture, and military vehicle/troop tracking. The BATS project combines terrestrial ADSL, mobile and satellite systems through an intelligent gateway to provide over

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Space & Satellite News Updates – 7th July 2015
Zahid Ghadialy, Technical Program Manager, techUK

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Oneweb: Global internet via satellites
• Oneweb has closed a $500 million funding round to build a LEO satellite
broadband network
• Board members include Virgin group, Qualcomm, Airbus, Bharti Enterprises,
Coca Cola, Group Salinas, Hughes Network Systems, and Intelsat
• Airbus has confirmed it would be building the 900 satellites
• 648 will be launched in the orbit and the rest would be kept as spares on ground
• Plans of over 65 launches including 39 from Virgin's spaceflight company Virgin Galactic, and 21
from Europe's Arianespace using Russian-made Soyuz rockets.
• Launches in 2017 and services start by 2019.
Source: The next web, NBC news, Daily mail

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Project Mustang: Worldwide IoT coverage
• Airbus Defence and space in partnership
with SIGFOX and SYSMECA, and the CEA-
Leti research centre; supported by French
government.
• Satellite links will use a dedicated
communication protocol to ensure
excellent coverage using a small form
factor terminal, while 868 and 915 MHz ISM
band will be used to communicate with
the SIGFOX terrestrial network.
• The three-year project will involve the
development of the terminal’s modem
chipset, the optimisation of
communication protocols and the
validation of the system through an
aircraft application demonstration.
Source: Airbus Defence and Space, M2M World news

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Nano satellites for disaster relief and agriculture
• Terran Orbital is launching small satellites that
orbit at only 600 kilometers. That lower altitude
makes it practical for low-powered, even
disposable, sensors to use a satellite data link
• Multiple constellations of “nano satellites”
designed to provide small, battery-powered
sensors with a cheap data connection that
never goes down.
• Will have many civilian and commercial
applications and save lives in the wake of
natural disasters or terrorist attacks.
• The U.S. army is to use Terran sensors to track
vehicles and troops that transmit at tens of
kilobytes per second. But Terran expects
lower-powered sensors to send up data at
about a tenth that speed.
Source: MIT Technology review

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Broadband Access Via Integrated Terrestrial &
Satellite Systems (BATS)
• Funded under the European Union 7th
Framework Programme, aims to bridge
the potentially widening Broadband
divide between urban and rural areas in
order to meet the objectives set forth in
the EC Digital Agenda: universal
availability of Broadband speeds of at
least 30 Mb/s throughout Europe, with 50%
having speeds above 100 Mb/s.
• specialised Intelligent User Gateway (IUG)
that can connect to ADSL, Mobile and
Satellite. The assumption is that in areas of
poor conectivity, ADSL can provide
2Mbps and the mobile could do
something similar, upto 8Mbps. The
satellites can easily do 20Mbps.
• Presentations available here.
Source: BATS project page