Leosat Announces the Appointment of Vern Fotheringham as Chief
Executive Officer
Leosat, LLC, a company developing a low earth orbit (LEO)
satellite constellation to provide worldwide coverage that sets
new standards in satellite performance, today announced the
appointment of Vern Fotheringham as Chief Executive Officer and
outlined the company’s vision publicly for the first time since
beginning its development in 2013.
Founded by former Schlumberger executives Cliff Anders and Phil
Marlar, Leosat has been developing its network architecture, spectrum
planning, and satellite payload since 2013. This work has been done in
conjunction with several leading global aerospace engineering
contractors and satellite equipment manufacturers and has created a
solid foundation upon which to build the company’s global operations and
market reach. The company’s vision is to deliver cost-effective,
extremely high-speed, low-latency, highly secured data network service
offerings to address the unmet needs of business and government markets.
“This is an exciting time in the satellite industry, with technology
driving increased demand, costs coming down and several notable players
such as Google, SpaceX and OneWeb helping to fuel the category,” said
Christopher Baugh, president and founder of NSR, a satellite industry
consulting company. “Leosat is positioning its service offerings
primarily on potentially lucrative business and government market
opportunities. There is a big international market to be served by a
unified global broadband network with significant revenue potential at
stake.”
“Given the strategic objectives associated with Leosat’s next stage
of development, it was important to bring in an industry leader with a
proven track record of innovation and corporate development,” stated
Cliff Anders, co-founder of Leosat. “When we became aware that Vern was
available, we knew we had found the right satellite industry pioneer to
help us build Leosat into a world-class organization and operating
company.”
Fotheringham, who most recently was Chairman and CEO of Kymeta
Corporation, has more than 30 years of experience in the broadband
wireless and satellite communications industry. He has created and built
numerous successful ventures and contributed to many large-scale
projects for major service providers, system vendors and software
solution suppliers. He has also been a public policy and regulatory
advocate for new telecommunications service rules and standards, and an
inventor and creator of now globally adopted standards, and innovative
new products, and services. In his role with Leosat, Fotheringham will
be introducing the company to the global satellite industry, the
international financial community and the customer market for a range of
new innovative services.
“When I was approached about joining Leosat, it represented a perfect
opportunity to meld my personal interest and experience in advancing the
future of Non-Geo-Synchronous Orbit (NGSO) broadband satellite systems
with an organization that shares my vision and enjoys a significant head
start over the rapidly growing field of new entrants seeking to exploit
the unique capabilities of NGSO satellite communications,” explained
Fotheringham. “We are positioning Leosat on new solutions primarily
addressing business and government market opportunities. We will be
announcing some very significant strategic global alignments and service
delivery partnerships over the coming months.”