The LEO satellite opportunity is vast but complex - Dawie de Wet — The author, Dawie de Wet

The global low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite industry has advanced well into its initial market adoption phase. SpaceX’s Starlink and Eutelsat OneWeb are delivering services in Africa while other global operators (including Amazon Kuiper, Telesat Lightspeed, Rivada Outernet and several Chinese players) are preparing to enter the market in 2026/2027.

The fundamental technology architecture deployed by all these operators relies on the use of communication satellites in low orbits to deliver high-performance, low-cost services to the global market. However, because each operator has developed different end-to-end service delivery platforms and business models to serve the global end-user market, this is also the only common denominator.

These end-to-end service delivery platforms are inevitably designed to service the global market and offer universal end-user service profiles that can meet the requirements of all users, regardless of location or market sector. The design of an end-user service profile portfolio that meets user requirements worldwide is feasible as long as it’s a standard broadband access service.

However, when the requirements of niche markets such as the financial, industrial or retail sectors are taken into account, the design of a single product set to serve the global market requires compromises in terms of cost and performance. The situation is further complicated when regional and country-specific requirements (such as the need for direct physical integration with customer fibre and core networks, management systems and service compliance requirements) are factored in.

The outcome of this scenario is that global operators with standard broadband products, designed to serve the global market, are not ideally positioned to serve the needs of Africa’s business customers. In short, a generic service portfolio will most likely appear as a compromised option in African settings.

Introducing smart LEO networks

The good news is that an alternative exists, one that could be described as the best of both worlds.

Yes, global LEO networks are breaking free of previous constraints in terms of cost and performance in the “connecting anywhere” paradigm and, yes, LEO-enabled networks will grow to become a dominant force in the telecommunications sector. The question is how to leverage global LEO networks while at the same time meeting Africa’s specific requirements.

One option is to develop a network that operates on the global LEO constellation with an end-user product service portfolio designed to meet the requirements of a specific market sector. The ground infrastructure and ground interconnection solutions needed to enable seamless integration with customer networks could then be added to this network. This is precisely what Eutelsat OneWeb and Q-KON did in creating the Twoobii-LEO Smart Network.

Read: Low-Earth orbit satellites – the way forward for Africa

The Eutelsat OneWeb LEO constellation offers specific technology and performance advantages engineered for the African enterprise market. In particular, the OneWeb constellation includes local gateway infrastructure in Africa with regional points of presence, while the user terminals are designed to deliver high uptime for the enterprise and industrial markets.

Leveraging the technology advantages of LEO constellations, Eutelsat OneWeb engineers committed to developing a Smart Network domain on the LEO constellation that can be exclusively used to serve Q-KON’s customers and meet specific African customer-centric requirements. With this Smart Network domain as a foundation, Q-KON then added Twoobii smart satellite services functionality to better define specific use-case profiles and unlock the inherent advantages of this model.

The satellite LEO industry is only starting to develop, and it is expected that more and more global operators will enter the space and further develop this new, large-scale sector.

Read: Astonishing Starlink satellite map shows constellation in real time

Each operator will strive to develop a network with specific advantages and leverage unique technologies. Each will have to find the technology and business model needed to enable the benefits of global satellite “mega constellations” while serving end users with bespoke service profiles.