The Growing Thirst for Satellite Bandwidth and The Impact of Interference

Updated: November 12, 2010

For many of the smaller satellite operators, resellers, and users of bandwidth services, the significant costs of establishing and operating a modern SATCOM NetOps infrastructure has proven to be prohibitive, with implementation often being beyond the means of smaller organizations. The scarcity of cash and the difficulty for companies to finance or invest in new systems is a concern for most business.

To mitigate these risks, and to meet the needs of these smaller organizations and of others who wish to outsource their requirements, the use of turnkey subscription services gives customers access to industry leading solutions without the upfront capital investment and the added benefit of significantly reducing annual operating expenses.

At Integral Systems, we have been working closely with our aerospace and communications customers for almost 30 years to solve their critical satellite command and control, signal processing, network management and Radio Frequency (RF) monitoring, interference detection and geolocation problems.

As we evaluated the market, and in discussions with our customers, it became clear that there was a need to provide interference monitoring, detection and geolocation capabilities as a service. The ability to successfully monitor carrier signals, identify interference and geolocate the source is incredibly difficult to do. In addition, for small- to mid-sized satellite operators, service providers, resellers and broadcasters, the upfront capital costs and on-going operating expenses, often times put the best-in-class solutions out of reach.

According to estimates by industry groups, an operator managing a small fleet of satellites can expect interference to cost up to $2 million per year. With millions of dollars per year in lost revenue and decreased margins on the line, turning to inferior interference detection and geolocation systems or attempting the "do-it-yourself" method in attempt to save money is no longer a viable option.

To meet the needs of these customers, we formed an autonomous group to offer these and other related managed services to commercial and government customers. Integral Systems Service Solutions (IS3) brings together our industry-leading Monics® signal monitoring and interference detection system, which is in use by an overwhelming majority of satellite operators globally, and our satID® Geolocation solution, the most accurate geolocation system on the market.

Earlier this year, a major international broadcaster utilized our satID Expert with Monics comprehensive interference monitoring, detection and geolocation system, along with our technical experts, to restore its broadcast signal to millions of FIFA World Cup™ viewers in the Middle East and North Africa. We partnered with the broadcast network to quickly, easily and accurately identify and locate the source of the interference. As a testament to the power and precision of the system, the interferer's location was located within three kilometers.