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Technology Stocks : Loral Space & Communications -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Snake who wrote (2342)	3/25/1998 5:23:00 PM
From: Valueman	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 10852

It is good to see some public activity at C*: CYBERSTAR ÿ A Global Broadband Services Provider Visit us at NAB April 6-9 in Las Vegas Sands Expo Center Booth I-11212 home Events Theater Presentation: CyberStar booth, "Expanding your Horizon" CyberStar Press Conference: Monday, April 6, 6:00-7:30pm CyberStar Booth, Sands Expo Center, I-11212, Invitation Only. Loral Party Celebration: Monday, April 6, 6-9 p.m., Desert Inn (Invitation Only) Panel Session "LEOs, MEOs and GEOs, The Future of Broadband Communications via Satellite", Tuesday, April 7, 2-3:15P.M. Sales and Partner meetings, Mirage Hotel, all week and CYBERSTAR ÿ A Global Broadband Service Like Nothing on Earth. Come see us at the Village Internet/Intranet Solutions Pavillion, Booth 1715 Phoenix, AZ March 25-28 home Events Seminar: Broadband communications like nothing on earth. When: Friday, March 27, 12:30 - 1 p.m. and Saturday, March 28 11:30a.m. - 12 p.m. Location: Room 3

To: Snake who wrote (2342)	3/25/1998 8:19:00 PM
From: Bernard Levy	Respond to of 10852

I apologize for emphasizing repeatedly the same topic, but we need to look carefully at the economics of broadband data services by satellite. The Skybridge system is based on LEO satellites which will connect terminals on customer premises to gateways located in a 150km radius of the customer location. It will offer asymmetric 2-way data connections, with rates of up to 40Mb/sec on the downlink and 2 Mb/sec on the uplink. Skybridge mentions that satellite based services will be cheaper than competitive services, but I have a hard time believing this could be the case. What are the competitive services: a) 2-way LMDS, which is a ground based wireless service. The FCC just completed the auction for the LMDS licenses in the 28 GHz band. The 1.3Ghz of spectrum which was just auctioned allows data rates of up to 2Gb/sec in each cell. The main equipment vendors are LU, Nortel and Bosch Telecom. The LU system (originally designed by HP) provides also for data rates to each customer of 40Mb/sec in the downlink, 2Mb/sec in the uplink. Cells will then be connected together by fiber, which in turn would be tied to a land based communication (presumably fiber based) network. b) 2-way HFC. It is also a shared medium (like wireless by satellite or LMDS) which conceptually allows rates of up to 1 Gb/sec to be shared among all users connected to the same cable. The rates achievable are comparable to those of Skybridge. Note however that HFC cables must be 2-way activated, which may require very costly upgrades. c) x-DSL. Although ADSL allows only about 2-6 Mb/sec in the downlink, and 500kb/sec in the uplink, a shorter distance version called VDSL has the potential to allow 50Mb/sec on the downlink. x-DSL is a point-to-point transmission system connecting a customer to the phone company central office. The only cost here are the modems at both end of the line. Lines with coils cannot be used, and bridge taps create also some problems, so that phone lines may need to be upgraded in certain areas, which could be costly. I am willing to accept that Skybridge will get all the customers living in areas lacking a proper land based infrastructure. Unfortunately, customers with a strong need for broadband data services tend to live in highly developed countries. What am I missing? Could broadband data services by satellite compete against land-based services. My instinct would be to say no, but may be the numbers tell otherwise. For techies reading this thread, the July 1997 issue of IEEE Communications Magazine contained several articles on broadband via satellite. I also found an interesting report from a team of NASA Lewis researchers on ''Direct data distribution from low earth orbit.'' It discusses LEOs but carried experiments with the Advanced Communication Technology Satellite (ACTS) mentioned by Valueman in an earlier message, which is a GEO.