For Commercial Satellite Telecom, 25 Years Is a Lifetime

摘要

The growth of satellite telecommunications over the past 25 years is the story of government research and development, and technology-demonstration missions, aided by the occasional military system, gradually giving rise to a commercial space business. There are those who say even in 2014 that there is no such thing as a commercial space market. Their argument: Satellite builders still depend on government business, mainly but not only military, to help with nonrecurring engineering costs. Launch service providers cannot survive without a reliable government market willing to pay premium launch prices. Satellite fleet operators - the people with the 80 percent earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) margins - depend on government-subsidized launchers to grow and maintain their fleets and to keep their already high capital spending from exploding. All that is true, but a 25-year perspective provides a clear measure of how far the commercial satcom sector has come, most of it on the back of the astonishing growth in demand for television. The television demand in the United States has been enough to sustain two commercial satellite-television providers, DirecTV and Dish Network/EchoStar, which are both expanding into Latin America.