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ViaSat and Eutelsat to Develop Consumer Broadband by Satellite Services for Europe |
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PARIS, Feb. 21, 2007/Satnews Daily/ ― Eutelsat Communications (Euronext Paris: ETL) and ViaSat, Inc. (Nasdaq:VSAT) will jointly offer affordable consumer broadband satellite service in Europe's underserved markets. The new partnership will bring together Eutelsat, a leading European satellite operator and its Skylogic broadband affiliate, with ViaSat, a producer of satellite networking systems. Starting this June, the service will use Ka-band capacity on Eutelsat's Hot Bird-6 satellite, with hub operations supplied by Skylogic from its SkyPark teleport in Turin, Italy. The new service will be based on the ViaSat SurfBeam Docsis two-way broadband satellite system, a highly scaleable open standards-based platform that lowers the cost of consumer terminals and service. The system is already used in North America by WildBlue Communications, which has over 100,000 customers since its 2005 launch. "ViaSat and Eutelsat have a tradition of successful cooperation, and we are excited about this initiative to bring high-quality broadband access to European consumers beyond the reach of DSL," said Marc Agnew, vice president of Broadband Systems at ViaSat. "By combining ViaSat Docsis-for-satellite technology with Eutelsat Ka-band satellite capacity and Skylogic operational experience, we're testing a competitive, affordable service to expand the reach of the European consumer broadband market." "With our experience over the last years in supplying turnkey broadband solutions for Europe and around the globe, Eutelsat and Skylogic are well-positioned to address the consumer market for satellite broadband services in Europe's geographically challenged locations," said Arduino Patacchini, director Multimedia Department at Eutelsat and CEO of Skylogic. "ViaSat technology underpins successful satellite broadband services in North America and Latin America, making them the perfect fit for us and for future customers of our service. We look forward to a successful collaboration as we introduce this new service in Europe." Under terms of the joint commercial cooperation agreement, commercial services in selected western European markets including Germany, Switzerland, Spain, and Portugal will start to roll out from June 2007. Eutelsat will provide additional capacity for any expansion of services on its Ka-band or Ku-band satellites, which cover Europe and the Mediterranean Basin. PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that by 2010, 58 percent (94.8 million) of households in Western Europe will be broadband households, up from 30 percent in 2005. Broadband access spending will increase by 12.9 percent compounded annually to $48.2 billion in 2010. The ViaSat SurfBeam system is an open standards-based network that leverages the cable modem networking technology called Docsis. ViaSat developed a satellite air interface that is seamlessly integrated into Docsis head-end termination systems and leverages low cost Docsis customer premises chips and software used by tens of millions of cable customers. ViaSat's SurfBeam system can enable two-way satellite broadband service pricing that is comparable to terrestrial, but in areas with population densities too low to be economical for existing wired or wireless networks. The satellite air interface also includes technology that mitigates rain fade, a reduction in signal strength caused by heavy rain that at one time was thought to be a potential barrier to successful deployment of Ka-band satellite systems. The ViaSat system automatically responds to rain fade with uplink power control and adaptive data coding techniques that help overcome potential outages, while optimizing the use of satellite transponder bandwidth. Skylogic, Eutelsat's broadband affiliate, recently teamed with ViaSat and Arinc to provide in-flight communications to business jets flying in Europe. With capacity on 23 satellites that provide coverage over the entire European continent, as well as the Middle East, Africa, India and significant parts of Asia and the Americas, Eutelsat is one of the world's three leading satellite operators in terms of revenues. In 2006, Eutelsat's satellites broadcasted to over 2,400 television channels and 1,000 radio stations. Skylogic operates one of the world's leading satellite broadband IP platforms. Its operational center, SkyPark, is equipped to offer a complete range of broadband services including content distribution, IP videostreaming, business TV, maritime applications, teleconferencing, remote control of installations, telemedicine, e-learning and Voice over IP. ViaSat produces satellite and other communication products that enable fast, secure, and efficient communications to any location. The company provides networking products and managed network services for enterprise IP applications; is a key supplier of network-centric military communications and encryption technologies to the U.S. government; and is the primary technology partner for gateway and customer premises equipment for consumer and mobile satellite broadband services.
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