Viasat took in $1.2 billion last quarter, but also recognized $1.6 billion in write-offs related to satellite failures and program cancellations. More interesting, however, is growing clarity of what the future constellation will look like – and who the future customer base will be – for the combined companies.
Satellite
Slower upgrade pacing hits Gogo’s hardware deliveries
Gogo has, once again, revised its revenue guidance lower for 2023. The company now expects 2023 full year revenue between $390-400 million, down from a forecast $440-455 million forecast at the beginning of the year.
Panasonic Avionics picks Superbird-9 to further extend GEO capacity
Panasonic Avionics continues to boost its satellite capacity, securing access to the SKY Perfect JSAT Superbird-9 satellite for high throughput services focused on traffic over and around Japan.
Delta selects Hughes to complete Wi-Fi upgrades
Delta Air Lines will add diversity to its inflight internet supply and Hughes has a launch customer for its new Jupiter in-flight service offering. The two will pair up to bring Wi-Fi to more than 400 aircraft across Delta’s fleet.
SES plans mPOWER constellation expansion to counter performance problems
The SES mPOWER constellation will grow by two satellites to offset shortcomings on the initial six.
KONNECT VHTS comes online, boosting Eutelsat capacity
Eutelsat’s KONNECT VHTS satellite is now active, bringing 500 Gbps of Ka-band capacity into service over Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East
Viasat updates pricing plans in BizAv push
Viasat expects to deliver improved inflight connectivity to its business aviation customers from early 2024. This “expanded range of service options,” announced at NBAA 2023 in Las Vegas, will be available across a range of antenna terminal hardware
Viasat recovers 10% of capacity, will not replace ViaSat-3 Americas satellite
Just 10% of the ViaSat-3 F1 satellite’s planned capacity will be available, the company has confirmed. Still, that should leave the satellite as one of the highest capacity systems in orbit, enough that Viasat “remains confident that it will meet the current and future needs of its mobility customers.” A replacement satellite will not be required.
In search of the optimal curves for drag performance
Aircraft generally adhere to the “less is more” principle, with smaller and lighter components winning out for installation. So hearing that a larger radome might reduce drag on their aircraft relative to smaller options definitely piqued my curiosity.
SkyFive sees “wildly inconsistent” performance across inflight connectivity services
Which is the best inflight internet service flying today? SkyFive recently performed a series of measurements across Europe, benchmarking various systems. The results are, as expected, less than compelling.