Boeing to Build 3 Satellites for Mobile Satellite Ventures

The manufacturing contract adds a corner piece to the hybrid satellite/terrestrial puzzle MSV is designing in the L-band. MSV officials said they envision the 3 spacecraft as the backbone of an advanced telecom network that’s been 10 years on the drawing board. The network will combine the best of satellite with the best of terrestrial wireless to form one, ubiquitous voice and data network for everyone from first responders to consumers living beyond cellular providers’ reach, MSV officials have said.

The spacecraft will feature antennas 75 ft. across and supply 11,000 w, which MSV officials said will be enough juice to connect the satellite to cellular-sized handsets at 64-128 kbps. But the complimentary ground network, built under the purview of an Ancillary Terrestrial Component (ATC) license from the FCC, will be faster, said MSV Vp-Space Segment Programs Robert Sorbello. Terrestrial speeds will hinge upon the air interface MSV selects, Sorbello said: “We're in the process of a final selection of air interfaces and we have an RFI going out here shortly. The decision will be made in the first half of 2006,” he said. The firm has tried out CDMA and is exploring WiMAX and other options, he said.

Boeing’s manufacturing contract includes parts of MSV’s ground system, namely designing the satellite’s spot beam format to maximize MSV’s flexibility and limit interference, Boeing officials said. The first satellite, MSV 1, will be built 44 months from now, and the other 2 satellites will follow in 5 month increments, said Boeing’s Howard Chambers, vp-space & intelligence systems. Launches are slated for 2009 and 2010, MSV officials said. MSV 1 and MSV 2 will cover Canada and the U.S. and MSV SA will serve S. America, they said. Good said MSV is “working on landing rights and ground segments” in Latin America too.

A partner for developing MSV’s Ancillary Terrestrial Component on the ground -- the other half of the puzzle -- wasn’t announced. “We are actively in discussions and partnerships will be announced as they occur,” said Good: “What we have been busy doing is ensuring we have the right plan going forward.” MSV officials said the cost of the ATC network will depend on how aggressively MSV builds, and where. “There are any number of different options and we are well-funded for the foreseeable future,” Good said.

Good said he wouldn’t comment on market rumors that DirecTV and/or EchoStar are eyeing MSV: “I think it’s fair to say there are a number of people who see the opportunity here, especially with a network that uses new air interfaces and is potentially on an all-IP backbone network -- people interested in wireless and in distributing content.”

“If this works, it’s a really big deal for MSV,” said Frost & Sullivan satellite industry analyst Max Engel. MSV’s push is the 3rd or 4th stab at mobile telephony via satellite, Engel said. Predecessors like Iridium and Globalstar failed to expand mobile satellite communication from niche markets like govt. and the oil industry, mostly because the phones were too large and the service was too expensive, Engel said: “No one has succeeded in making this mainstream. MSV is trying to do it by offloading most of the calls to ground stations… The satellite provides an overall glue to keep the system together, so most people aren’t paying for satellite time.”

“But you certainly get into questions of how the system is going to be designed to cope with future demands” like video to the cellphone, Engel said: “One of the basic questions is how high of a demand are cellphone networks like this going to be? Are they bringing a 2005 system online in 2010?”