Skyware Global Awarded Viasat Contract For KA-SAT Satellite Launches

15 March 2010

Skyware Global has been awarded a contract by ViaSat Inc. which will help deliver high-speed broadband via satellite to millions of customers throughout North America, Europe, the Middle East and Africa with the deployment of two new consumer Ka-band antenna models.

Skyware Global will design and supply antennas for use as part of the ViaSat SurfBeam® 2 outdoor unit (ODU). The SurfBeam 2 system is an evolution of ViaSat’s popular SurfBeam broadband Internet-over-satellite system used by WildBlue for the fastest growing satellite broadband network in the world.

The first new Skyware Global antenna is being deployed for use with the Eutelsat KA-SAT satellite, a high capacity Ka-band spot beam satellite with planned coverage over Europe, the Middle East, and Northern Africa. Eutelsat will use this satellite to deliver Tooway™, a new system for two-way broadband services, allowing uplink and downlink communications via satellite. The Eutelsat KA-SAT satellite will deliver a total throughput of 70 Gigabits per second.

The second antenna is being designed for ViaSat’s own satellite, ViaSat-1, scheduled to launch in 2011, and designed to deliver over 100 Gbps of broadband capacity to the North American market. Both satellites will offer broadband-over-satellite, with speeds comparable to the best DSL offerings.

Marc Agnew, vice president and general manager of ViaSat Satellite Broadband Systems, says: “The new generation of Ka-band satellites will enable satellite to be a serious competitor to terrestrial-based broadband services, with much higher speeds and better quality of service demanded by subscribers for today’s media-rich Internet experience.  We chose Skyware Global for its proven track record as sole supplier of subscriber Ka-band antennas for WildBlue, which we acquired last December, and for its continued work investing in and developing cutting-edge antennas that match end user requirements.”

The SurfBeam 2 infrastructure is designed and architected to support millions of subscribers. The design and capabilities of Skyware Global antenna products will go towards helping ViaSat to provide this economical, scalable system built to handle rapid network growth.

David McCourt, CEO at Skyware Global adds: “This contract with ViaSat enables us to help the industry to make broadband Internet access via satellite a customer experience that matches growing subscriber bandwidth demand. We are committed to lowering maintenance and service costs, whilst investing in innovation and quality, to ensure that our customers are competitive with existing broadband services.”