News Analysis

SpaceX: The New Kids on the Block are Up and Flying

 by Elisabeth Tweedie

Cape Canaveral, Florida, June 15, 2010--SpaceX was never going to be a “quiet” company.  From its early days in 2002 it has attracted publicity, some good but much of it highly critical both of its objectives and of its ability to achieve them. 

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Global Satellite Industry Grew 11.7% in 2009-SIA

Washington, D.C., June 8, 2010 – The Satellite Industry Association (SIA) released its 2010 State of the Satellite Industry Report, showing an 11 percent growth from 2008 to 2009 in overall world satellite industry revenues. Global revenues for the satellite industry totaled $160.9 billion in 2009, resulting in an average an annual industry growth rate of 11.7 percent from 2004 through 2009. 

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Mobile TV for the US: Ready for Prime Time?

by Elisabeth Tweedie, Contributing Editor

Los Angeles, Calif., May 17,2010--The OMVC (Open Mobile Video Coalition) took a prominent position at NAB this year with the Mobile DTV Marketplace set up in the Central Lobby and a Mobile DTV Pavilion in the South Hall, as well as hosting a breakfast and speaking at several sessions. The OMVC is an association of nearly 900 TV broadcasters supporting the A/153 ATSC Mobile DTV Standard which was adopted by the ATSC in October 2009. This is an in-band system providing the mobile service as part of the terrestrial transmission within the same 6MHz channel used for ATSC HD and SD programming.  

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Strategic Growth and More to Come: SatComs in the Maritime Space

By Martin Jarrold

Chief of International Program Development, GVF

London, May 14, 2010--Over the last few years I have been devoting a not insignificant percentage of my work energies to activities linked to the offshore and maritime sectors – strategically important customers of satellite industry equipment vendors, service providers, and operators. If you are a regular reader of this column, you will know all about the GVF Oil & Gas Communications Europe event that is taking place in Aberdeen, Scotland, as I write; and, about the forthcoming Broadband Maritime Europe 2010 conference that will take place in London, England, 28-29 June.

World Teleport Association Publishes Report on Best Practices in Energy Efficiency

New York City, May 6, 2010 – The World Teleport Association (WTA) announced the release of a new white paper, Strategies for Sustainability. The report presents WTA’s findings and outcomes from its March 2010 Member Forum on the Green Teleport as well as in-depth interviews conducted with early adopters of advanced energy management solutions among the Association’s membership. 

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Everything is Coming Up 3D: Or is it?

by Virgil Labrador

Editor-in-Chief

Los Angeles, Calif. April 30, 2010--During the most recent broadcasting trade shows since the IBC in Amsterdam last fall, 3D technology has been the buzz including the NAB show in Las Vegas early this month. The blockbuster success of 3D movies such as Avatar help fuel interest in 3D technology among tech-savvy consumers, but will 3D—essentially a recycled technology that was first introduced in the 50s and became a passing fad—deliver the goods this time around? 

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The Business Case for 3D: Two Swallows Do not make a Summer

by Elisabeth Tweedie

Los Angeles,Calif.  April 30, 2010. When I think about 3D the British expression "two swallows don’t make a summer" keeps coming to mind. In the last few months we’ve indeed seen two "swallows": "Avatar" and "Alice in Wonderland", both of which generated the vast majority of their significant revenue (they were respectively the 1st and 22nd highest grossing films ever) from the theaters showing the movies in 3D. "Call of the Wild" also in 3D was released six months before "Avatar" but only managed to produce box office revenues of around $30,000 in the US.

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The State of Play in the Global VSAT Market

by Chris Frith 

President, AUSPresence

A telco PR executive once remarked to me that satellite was like a solution always looking for a problem.  Given that he was looking to represent my satellite consultancy firm, I thought this was an odd way to earn my business!  Dents to my ego aside, what this guy was reflecting is simply the wider telecommunications industry and a great many potential customers’ perception of satellite – VSAT communications in particular.  How things have changed! Now, not only do the problems exist – let’s refer to them as needs (it’s more marketing friendly) but also customers are willing and have the means to pay for them. Today, we have broadband satellite providing internet access not just in the remote areas but right up close to population centres; innovative service providers are marketing hybrid satellite networks on the basis of their increased reliability and quick deploy systems which provide large scale connectivity to those first on the ground when disaster strikes. So let’s take a closer look at what needs are emerging and how leading VSAT service providers are rising to the challenge. Then we’ll take a look into the crystal ball to see where this is heading.

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ITU Standards in Disaster Relief: The Role of Satellites

by Roxana Dunnette

The increasing use of telecommunications and ICTs for emergency communications, international agreements, new national policies, partnerships for cooperation in emergency are important tools already in place for even faster response to disasters.The International Telecommuni-cations Union (ITU) as the UN agency encharged with telecom-munications and information communications techno-logies (ICT) is leading the efforts in harmonizing technologies, services and establishing standards for emergency com-munications. All ITU sectors are involved and are working hard at the complexity of this issue. This article presents a short summary of ITU standards, recom-mendations and studies on the subject of emergency communications.

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The Satellite Industry Responds to the Haiti Relief Efforts

 by Virgil Labrador, Editor-in-Chief

The satellite industry responded again admirably in the wake of the catastrophic earthquake in Haiti. The response to a crisis can highlight  the unique advantages of satellite technology as well as its limitations.

 

 

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