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Delivering satellite services depends on collaboration among many partners. The companies that can orchestrate the ecosystem to deliver differentiated services will be the ones that unlock new value opportunities. Celfocus’ Pedro Fonseca explains.
Pedro Fonseca, Celfocus
Satellite advantage won’t come from connectivity alone
Satellite communications are entering a new era. Advances in technology, direct-to-device (D2D) services, and the convergence of terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks are expanding possibilities for global connectivity. Yet technological progress on its own will not guarantee sustainable business growth.
The strategic challenge is no longer simply how to connect more people and places, but how to turn connectivity into a differentiated, scalable and profitable business.
Telecom operators built sophisticated capabilities for product catalogs, charging, billing, and customer and partner management, but connectivity still became commoditized. Satellite operators can learn from this by building digital and commercial capabilities into their operating models from Day One, adapting proven telecom principles to their own technical and commercial realities.
The goal is a differentiated service business, not just a more efficient connectivity business: managed connectivity with service guarantees and analytics for maritime and aviation; satellite Internet of Things (IoT) bundled with device management; D2D offered as a premium add-on through mobile operators; or sovereign connectivity for government. Each requires the ability to design, price, partner and bill across organizations.
Satellite services often depend on many organizations such as ground stations, points of presence, infrastructure providers, resellers, terrestrial operators, and enterprise or government customers. Each brings its own systems and processes, while services, customer relationships and revenue streams cross organizational and national boundaries.
This creates a fundamental challenge: Managing connectivity is not the same as managing the business ecosystem that delivers it.
Who owns the customer relationship when several partners deliver the service? Who is accountable for the end-to-end experience? How are revenues shared and settlements calculated? How can new partners and services be added without costly, bespoke integrations?
These are not back-office concerns. They determine an operator’s ability to scale, protect margins, launch new services and control the customer experience.
Customer ownership and governance must therefore be explicit elements of the operating model. Settlement and revenue-sharing mechanisms must support transparent, reliable commercial relationships. Service orchestration must coordinate not only network resources, but also the processes, responsibilities and interactions required to deliver the complete service.
Without the right capabilities, ecosystem complexity becomes friction. But with them, it becomes a competitive advantage.
Consider a hypothetical scenario where a satellite network operator partners with a mobile operator to offer D2D messaging and IoT connectivity to a logistics company tracking its fleet across remote regions. The service relies on the satellite operator’s capacity, third-party ground stations across several countries, the mobile operator’s core network and subscriber base, and an IoT platform provider responsible for device management and analytics.
The customer expects one contract and one invoice. The mobile operator wants to own the relationship. The satellite operator must be paid for usage measured in another system, while ground stations charge by pass and IoT platform per device.
When a truck loses connectivity, someone must determine whether the fault lies in the device, the satellite link, the ground segment or the terrestrial core. Who is accountable under the service level agreement (SLA)? Without a common foundation, each interaction becomes a bespoke integration or manual reconciliation, repeated with every new customer, partner or country.
TM Forum’s ODA for Satellite project (SODA) addresses this by extending ODA to provide standardized frameworks, operating models and governance between satellite and terrestrial players. In the scenario above, partners could exchange product, order, usage, fault and settlement information through common interfaces, onboard new partners faster, and deliver multi-orbit services with less friction.
Architecture alone is not enough. Operators must also choose their business models, each with different demands:
Most operators will combine these models, making customer ownership, partner responsibilities and revenue sharing explicit design decisions rather than afterthoughts.
These capabilities should not be viewed as supporting functions added after connectivity is available. They are fundamental building blocks of the business itself.
The satellite industry has a unique opportunity to draw on decades of telecommunications experience while taking a different path: one that embeds digital integration, ecosystem orchestration and commercial governance into its foundations.
The next competitive advantage in satellite communications may not belong to those who provide connectivity alone, but to those who orchestrate the ecosystem around it to deliver differentiated services and unlock new value opportunities.
