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Technology Stocks : KSAT - KSAT Satellite Networks Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jim Bishop who wrote (70)	2/11/2001 5:42:37 PM
From: NAUGHTY NOTES	Respond to of 73

Satellite Broadband Will Surge by 2005, Says Study Analysts predict worldwide connections will jump almost 25-fold. George A. Chidi Jr., IDG News Service Friday, February 09, 2001 While cable Internet and digital subscriber line installation has yet to take off in the consumer market, analysts are predicting that satellite broadband connections will soar skyward over the next four years. High-tech market analysis firm Dataquest, in a study released Thursday, is forecasting that the number of satellite terminals in the world's three major economic regions will increase from an installed base of 293,500 terminals last year to 7.2 million terminals in 2005. Most of these terminals are in North America now, with most of the remainder in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region. "I think that, fundamentally, we're going to see growth in all areas of broadband," says Patti Reali, a senior analyst for Dataquest. "I also think that cable and DSL aren't going to be able to reach everywhere." While cable is the best buy per kilobit for customers in residential areas, Reali says, it may not be profitable for land-based broadband providers to lay cable or optical fiber in areas with a low population density. Satellite broadband may be the only way for folks in the middle of nowhere to get fast downloads. "There will be a lot of parallels with adoption of digital satellite for television, like DirecTV and EchoStar, " she says. "All the early adopters were rural. It's the density per mile that counts." Current satellite services allow customers to receive and send data at speeds similar to DSL. The StarBand Communications service touts download speeds of up to 500 kilobits per second and uploads at 150 kbps, while Hughes Network Systems' DirecPC service promises downloads of up to 400 kbps and uploads of 125 kbps. Hardware and installation for either service is around $600, and service charges tend to be slightly more expensive than either cable or DSL service. Most terminals are in the consumer market, but Dataquest, a unit of Gartner Group, expects the business and consumer markets to have similar growth rates over the next five years. The analysts expect that by 2005 North America will account for 54 percent of all satellite broadband access terminals, with Europe and the Asia-Pacific region accounting for 30 percent and 16 percent respectively.