World Satellite Business Summit: The Importance of Partnerships and Collaboration

Collaboration is a crucial watchword for our industry. No one company or technology alone will ever be able to solve the world’s growing need for connections and connectivity. We also need to be responsible for the space environment and collectively address the space debris problem. And we need to collaborate to adopt standards and interoperability to create scale for our industry. We all must do it together, and businesses need to partner to provide the best solutions to tackle these challenges. 

This is a key reason why we are looking forward to participating in the World Satellite Business Summit in Paris next week. The event has been going strong for 25 years and serves as a critical forum for discussion and collaboration.

Influential and forward-thinking leaders from all over the world will congregate to address important issues, share insights and best practices, stimulate innovation, conduct business, and shape the future of our industry.

Collaboration is the only way we can solve our planet’s issues, and our industry should follow this model not only to address connectivity problems but also to align on space sustainability rules to address space debris. Members of our leadership team – including our CEO Dave Wajsgras – will be in Paris to discuss these and other initiatives and partnerships with other industry providers.

We also look forward to speaking with customers about their specific needs and maintaining the highest standards of service. Europe is a key region for our business, and we have a strong presence there with team members in Luxembourg, London, Fuchsstadt and Paris.

Our services provide critical connectivity to deliver television and radio content to more than 46 million households, and we’re a major supplier of global and secure service to government, telecom, enterprise, and mobility customers in Europe.

While in Paris, Dave will also be addressing the conference as part of the leaders’ panel. The theme of working together through partnership will very much be a key part of his comments. The partnership concept centers around the satellite industry where we are joining companies like OneWeb to provide best-in-class multi-orbit connectivity to the commercial aviation sector, and also working in a much more integrated way with telecoms and mobile operators. Traditionally, satellite communications has been viewed by some as the solution to reach regions where cables or towers cannot – an adjunct rather than an integrated part of the International Mobile Telecommunications infrastructure. That is beginning to change and we’re already seeing progress via the emergence of non-terrestrial standards and new digital communication standards to improve the backward compatibility and scalability of our ecosystem with the broader telecom market.

It is for this reason we are continuing to invest in our global unified network. We are on the cusp of expanding 5G into the space domain – merging the power of terrestrial connectivity with space connectivity – to deliver unrivaled coverage. But we can’t do this alone. This is the future, and it is built on collaboration. We’ll see you in Paris.