Mainstream satellite communications: Director General of RSCC Alexey Volin spoke about the synergy between GSO and NGSO operators
One of the most remarkable trends in the global market is the consolidation of GSO operators and non-GSO constellations; RSCC is also involved in this process, according to Alexey Volin, Director General of RSCC and Chairman of the Satellite Communications Center at the XXVIII International Conference SATCOMRUS 2023. The event took place on 28 September in Astrakhan.
“The ‘mainstream’ issue of the development of non-geostationary constellations (low-flyers, mid-flyers) has now begun to be implemented, not so much as independent projects, e.g. Elon Musk’s Starlink, but as the association of GSO and NGSO operators. Thus, synergy occurs due to combining the capabilities of both directions. The classic example is Eutelsat and OneWeb, but other large companies are also starting to cooperate and take advantage of both systems. This is a serious main direction along which the industry will most likely move,” noted Alexey Volin.
He also added that Russian Satellite Communications Company was keeping up with global trends and was involved in establishing cooperation between GSO and non-GSO operators. “Literally, during these months, we are very actively interacting with Gonets, Roscosmos and Reshetnev to promote the use of RSCC’s ground infrastructure for the needs of Gonets 2, Marathon IoT, Express-RV and Bureau 1440. Therefore, if all our plans come to fruition, we will install up to 60 ground stations at our facilities in the next few years. Thus, the number of stations using RSCC’s Space Communications Centers will increase by approximately 20%. These stations will work in the interests of our partners who are non-GSO operators,” said the Director General of RSCC at the plenary session of SATCOMRUS 2023.
The plenary session of the conference was moderated by the Advisor to the Director General, Chairman of the Board of the Association of Satellite Communications Market Participants Yuri Urlichich. He dwelt on global trends in the satellite industry and clarified that not all of them had been fully justified over time. “As for personal satellite communications and low-orbit data transmission systems, there are literally four companies that have avoided bankruptcy, three of them have become bankrupts. Iridium and Gonets can stay afloat largely due to the fact that they have an “anchor” customer. Many dozens of other projects were closed in this area due to its absence,” summed up Yuri Urlichich.