The growing role of LEO satellite connectivity

Satellites have been around for a long time; Inmarsat has been delivering connectivity at sea since 1979. But newer approaches are very different from the high-altitude, few-in-number philosophy of maritime communications – because they’re being driven by new use cases that involve millions of businesses and billions of people. 

And those applications need latency and bandwidth numbers that older systems can’t deliver.

SpaceX Starlink, Amazon LEO, and enterprise-focused OneWeb, to name a few, are offering reliable and redundant bandwidth from space-based infrastructure. In this article, we’ll explore what Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites bring to the connectivity party for today’s businesses – where they fit best and how to use them for your advantage.

GEO, MEO, and LEO: differences in space and time

Definitions first. While they work in different ways, the fundamental split between satellite technologies is the height they operate above Earth.

Getting GEOgraphic: the magic number of 35,786

GEO (Geostationary Earth Orbit) satellites maintain position at a precise altitude. (35,786km, give or take a few kms) That’s the point where an object “set in place” will orbit the Earth precisely once each day.

The point: that’s a long way up. It means transmissions from a single GEO satellite can cover half the planet (with some gaps at the poles.) It also means you don’t need many of them: Inmarsat has fewer than 15 up at any one time.

But there’s a downside. Being further away from the action means they need more power – which means bigger dishes, more solar panels, all the things that make a satellite heavier and more expensive to launch. (A single GEO bird’s budget is in the hundreds of millions of US$.) It also results in high latency, with packets taking 240 milliseconds for a single ping. That’s long, as anyone into video games, or on a Zoom call, will confirm.

MEO, myself, and I: staying closer to home

Closer to home is MEO: “Medium Earth Orbit”. As you’d guess, it’s lower than GEO: most fly 8,000-25,000 kilometers above our heads. 

At that altitude, MEOs still “see” around a third of the Earth’s surface, so you don’t need too many of them for 24/7 coverage. That makes them ideal for satnav: your car or phone gets a fix on its location from just three at a time, and about 30 in orbit do the job for both the USA’s GPS system and the EU’s Galileo. 

MEO’s also something of a sweet spot for the cost/benefit equation. While you need a few more of them than GEOs, each is much cheaper: smaller, simpler, and with a lower power draw. And, with a “ping” of 100 or so milliseconds, they halve the latency of GEOs. 

Letting LEO roar: the best choice for enterprise bandwidth

For LEO, “Low Earth Orbit”, their height above ground is never more than 2,000km, providing very competitive latency between 20-125 milliseconds. Power requirements and launch costs are minimal, too: most are smaller than a household appliance, with SpaceX’s Falcon 9 carrying over 20 into space per successful launch.

LEOs are also zippier, circling our planet every 90 minutes or so. Of course, being so low means they can’t “see” as big a slice of Earth as MEOs or GEOs – but operators can afford far more of them. OneWeb has over 600 in orbit, Starlink over 9,000, with these high numbers also providing redundancy.

While they sound like something from science fiction, these “constellations” rely on the same principle as terrestrial mobile. When you move around, your call gets handed off between nearby mobile masts and base stations with no interruption, thanks to “cells” of coverage and roaming technology bridging the gaps – and LEO satellite internet does the same thing. Unlike GEOs and most MEOs, LEOs are true networks in the sky, communicating and cooperating like a hive of bees.

Making LEO work: the use cases

So are LEOs perfect for today’s connectivity needs? The answer: they’re excellent – if put to work in the right way. 

GNX, as a tech-agnostic connectivity provider, doesn’t favor DIA over LEO, or the other way around – rather, we believe in snapping diverse solutions together from the right parts for the job. Let’s look next at where LEOs shine.

1. Fostering diversity: the security of a good backup 

Among GNX customers, this one’s a favorite: using LEO as failover connectivity if the main pipe goes down. An effective solution, because diversity isn’t as easy as many imagine.

In many regions, contracting with a second provider for “diversity” won’t do the job – because different ISPs will nonetheless use the same underlying infrastructure, like the main optic fiber coming into town. If that cable gets cut, that second link won’t save you. But a satellite network providing a spaceborne option? That’s real diversity. And the price is getting better every year.

Whether it is a backup or a tertiary link, this is a clear sweet spot for LEO in the modern enterprise.

2. Remote sites: connecting your far-flung resources

In places where there’s no fiber – still a surprising percentage of the Earth’s surface – LEOs are increasingly replacing GEOs and LTEs as an option. Oil platforms at sea, offshore agriculture such as fish farming, or mining operations can now benefit from multi-megabit connectivity for an entire team, using a small (and portable) dish. 

Of course, it’s wise to have more than one connection, which is why many remote-site operations use a point-to-point microwave or cellular-boosting antenna as their first choice, with satellite as a backup. But satellite service is falling in cost, and it’s increasingly an option for your main connection, too. 

3. Maritime applications: extra megabits on the high seas

Ship-to-shore phone calls have kept sailors in touch with their families for many decades, but higher-bandwidth applications have typically carried high costs. Meaning cost-conscious shipowners couldn’t justify broadband for anything more than mission-critical applications like navigation and resource planning.

LEO constellations are changing this. In many jurisdictions, a GEO connection is required by law at sea – but for everyday communications, mariners are connecting to LEOs instead. It’s meant an increase not just in raw megabits available, but in the applications that use it – with fleets now collaborating with head office via cloud services, and crew below decks enjoying video calling and internet access. Which makes for happier employees … and happier CEOs. 

4. Connected superheroes: LEO for first responders

Hope for the best, but plan for the worst. In case of an emergency, LEO connectivity can be the last source of connectivity when cell towers and fiber lines are down. 

Thanks to their portability and quick setup, LEO systems offer first responders and healthcare facilities a high-bandwidth, low-latency alternative for data-intensive applications such as live video, mapping, and telemedicine. 

Where NOT to use LEO … maybe

That said, satellite does not cover all use cases. These are just some examples where you should be considering other connectivity options:

• When ultra-low latency is required, such as in trading or where real-time connectivity is needed
• Mission-critical operations, as LEO satellites can still be subject to weather or constellation maintenance
• High-density campus or HQ connectivity where symmetrical bandwidth is needed. This is because LEO networks are still shared/broadband links, which means they cannot guarantee the same throughput or SLAs as a fiber DIA.
• Or sites with obstructed sky view

The point here: for many businesses, there’s a good choice of both wired and wireless connectivity on the market – and you should compare them all. At present, we don’t recommend using satellite as your sole internet connection unless there’s no other option. The good news: there usually is.

The GNX perspective: how to make LEOs work for you

At the heart of GNX is our GNX+ platform. It’s more than a database of providers – it’s a database of opportunities. 

Carrier- and technology-neutral, GNX+ doesn't favor specific partners or technologies. Instead, it matches your site requirements with our connectivity portfolio, helping you source the best available connectivity for your business. Anywhere in the world.

And once specified, your entire provision is covered under a single contract, giving you one point of contact, one invoice, and guaranteed service standards.

Just as LEO satellites add a new and exciting option for your internet underlay, GNX+ is how you manage the complexities of those options … letting you leverage them to reach new markets, enhance operational resilience, and enable novel applications that keep you profitable and growing.