Bernard:
The sat operators have always spoke of broadband via sat working along with terrestrial solutions. At this point, they can't compete with a terrestrial solution when available. For instance, a friend called me when he had waited 5 months already for his T-1 line to see if there was a sat alternative. There was, but the sales force suggested he wait for the T-1 because, even after the wait, the T-1 was a better alternative(more speed, lower cost, etc.). This difference is likely to change(notice ViaSat's 2Mbps solution out there now, with DAMA making it so you pay for bandwidth that you use and no more). But, in the end, I think the fiber will rule where it is available. Sat can't compete head to head until we get to the broadband GEO/LEO systems. I eagerly await more info from that group. There is a huge market. I am within a few minutes of a city of 8 million and my phone lines limit my internet access to 26K--the 56K modem is of no use.
Sats are really showing their stuff nowadays in backbone business. Orion and Intelsat are doing loads of business getting faraway ISP's hooked to the US backbone. There is a great demand for that, and the GEO satellite really excels in that role. It also excels at creating the "virtual network" where widely dispersed offices can be easily, quickly, and reliably linked via sat. Throw in IP Multicasting and you get data out to specific end users in the network extremely efficiently.
You are correct though in pointing out that we need hard data on relative cost, performance, reliability, ease of use.... |
