OneWeb Raises $500 Million, Places Rocket and Launch Orders

OneWeb has raised $500 million of funding from Airbus Group, Bharti Enterprises, Hughes Network Systems, a subsidiary of EchoStar Corp., Intelsat, Qualcomm Incorporated, The Coca-Cola Company, the Virgin Group, and Totalplay, a Grupo Salinas Company, owned by Ricardo B. Salinas.

The OneWeb user terminals are optionally solar powered, and support Long Term Evolution 4G, 3G, 2G and Wi-Fi access, suggesting the business model for OneWeb’s new fleet of low earth orbit satellites, namely trunking to mobile operator cell towers, with end user access using either Wi-Fi or mobile network protocols.

The network will also provide service to ships, planes, trains and oil platforms and interoperability with Intelsat’s fleet of Ku-band satellites.

Sunil Bharti Mittal, Founder and Chairman of Bharti Enterprises and Tom Enders, CEO of Airbus Group will be joining Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, Dr. Paul Jacobs, Executive Chairman of Qualcomm Incorporated, and Greg Wyler, founder of OneWeb, on the Board of Directors.

Each of the other founding shareholders also be board observers, will continue to advise the company and support OneWeb by providing  technical and manufacturing expertise, launch capabilities, and enabling access to potential customers.

OneWeb also said it has placed an order for more than 65 rockets including 21 Soyuz launch orders from Arianespace and 39 launches from Virgin Galactic’s LauncherOne.

The funding and equipment deals to follow are an important milestone towards actual launch of the constellation.

Sri Lanka Telecom to Deploy National Wi-Fi Hotspot Network

Sri Lanka Telecom is deploying a public hotspot network across Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka Telecom plans to launch multiple offerings including: single-use prepaid service, bundled subscriptions for existing broadband customers, automated offload for mobile users, and partnerships with external providers for roaming and wholesale.

“SLT’s carrier-grade WiFi network provides a host of direct, targeted marketing opportunities for shop owners, companies and big brands within these environments,” said Dileepa Wijesundera, Sri Lanka Telecom Group CEO.

At least in part, the new Wi-Fi network might function as did an earlier generation of Internet cafes, as ways for people to gain Internet access.

Pre-5G, IMT-2020 Standards are Going to Influence Each Other

One always can get an argument about whether “official standards” shape technology more than “market-dictated standards.” The reason is that most popular communications standards are the result of some combination of end user adoption that creates de facto standards, as well as de jure work by standards bodies.

Something like that will have as fifth generation mobile standards are created. On the “official” side, there are the coming IMT-2020 standards. On the other hand, many “pre-5G” initiatives are in the works.

That means the pre-5G de facto standards will influence the “official” standards to some extent, even as understanding of what might emerge as IMT-2020 will shape pre-5G capabilities.

With the International Telecommunications Union targeting 2020, and major mobile companies, especially in East Asia, targeting pre-5G introductions possibly in 2017, the influences will work both ways.

It might be reasonable to suggest that the core specs largely will be reflected in the pre-5G introductions, or at least the ability to migrate seamlessly.

First Use of O3b for Energy Company in West Africa

Hermes Datacomms has partnered with O3b Networks to deliver communications to a global oil company.

Hermes will deliver critical communications for the company’s operations in West Africa and a connection back to their regional headquarters in Europe.

The deal is the first to use O3b for oil and gas segment communications in West Africa, Hermes said.

Hermes Datacomms also works with O3b to deliver service in the Pacific and Southeast Asia regions.

Bouygues Rejects Altice Acquisition Offer

Bouygues Telecom has rejected a 10 billion euro ($11.3 billion) acquisition bid by Altice, ending, for the moment, both a major consolidation of the French mobile market, a reshuffling of market share leadership, and a decision by regulatory officials to approve or deny the market-reshaping deal.

The latest refusal is the third rebuff of an acquisition big by Bouygues over the last 12 months.

Altice, owner of mobile operator Numericable-SFR, has bought four companies in the past 18 months.

The 10 billion euro price tag valued the telecom business unit as much as the entire Bouygues group before the offer was made public.

Also, Bouygues was offered just 5.5 billion by Orange and Iliad, and eight billion euros by Altice itself.

PLDT Faces Same Structural Issues as Mobile Operators in Europe, North America

Just a few years ago, only service providers in some developed regions were confronting flat to negative revenue growth as high-margin legacy services dwindled. Today, the problem is spreading to a wider range of countries. Consider the situation faced by Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company in the Philippines.

The company operates in a wireless and fixed line segment, and had flat revenue  in the first quarter of 2015, with mobile service (Smart and Sun Cellular) revenues down four percent, while fixed network revenues climbed about one percent.

The good news is that “next generation” services grew. In the fixed network business, broadband revenues already account for 47 percent of total fixed line data revenues.

Fixed network broadband revenues grew by 10 percent during the quarter. Enterprise and other network services, which represent 45 percent of total fixed line data revenues, rose by seven percent.

Data center revenues were up by 23 percent in the quarter.

Also, even legacy fixed line voice revenues grew two percent.

On the other hand, mobile international voice shriveled 22 percent, largely because consumers switched to using services such as Skype. Text messaging revenues also dropped about five percent.

Mobile internet revenue grew 19 percent, quarter over quarter.

So PLDT is in a race, as are service providers in many developed nations. PLDT and other service providers have to grow new revenue sources at least as fast as legacy revenue decay. PLDT does have one advantage, though. It can rely on mobile data revenue, as smartphone adoption in the Philippines is low, only about 15 percent to 20 percent of the population owning a smartphone. In 2014, some 80 percent of Malaysian mobile users and 49 percent of Thai mobile users had smartphones.

Source: PLDT

Will IMT-2020 Support 20 Gbps, Under Some Conditions?

Will the new International Telecommunications Union IMT-2020 standard, likely to be known by consumers as 5G, will be extensible to 20 Gbps?

Maybe, eventually, as a top end capability, not a minimum requirement.

"As of now, I understand the peak data rate of IMT-2020 for enhanced Mobile Broadband is expected to reach 10 Gbps,” said ITU spokesman Sanjay Acharya. “However, under certain conditions and scenarios, IMT-2020 would support up to 20 Gbps peak data rate.”

ITU-R Study Group 5 will meet on July 21, 2015 to approve a recommendation, which will then become available during the Radiocommunication Assembly in October.”