EchoStar Corporation today announced that its subsidiary, EchoStar Global. has acquired Helios Wire, a satellite-enabled IoT connectivity company headquartered in Vancouver, Canada. The acquisition includes Helios' Australian subsidiaries Sirion Holdings and Sirion Global.

Sirion Global holds global spectrum rights for S-band Mobile Satellite Service (MSS), administered by Australia, and has been working to develop solutions for high volume asset tracking and monitoring applications by satellite.

Virgin Galactic (VG) and Social Capital Hedosophia (SCH), a public investment vehicle, today announced the completion of their previously announced business combination. The resulting company is named Virgin Galactic Holdings, Inc. (VGH) and its common stock, units and warrants are expected to commence trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the new ticker symbol “SPCE”, ”SPCE.U” and “SPCE WS", respectively, on October 28, 2019.

The Satellite Innovation conference and exhibition held  at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California from October 8-10 highlighted the latest industry trends and technological innovations. The conference featured over 120 speakers in 17 in-depth sessions and three keynote presentations. There was also an exhibition hall with 55 companies showcasing their products and services. The event organized by Satnews Publishers is now on its third year and is evolving into one of the must-attend  industry events in the West Coast of the US.  

On October 9, 2019, at 10:17:56 the Proton-M carrier rocket with Briz-M booster together with Eutelsat 5 West B and Mission Extension Vehicle-1 satellites successfully launched from launchpad No.39 pad No.200 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.The Proton active flight time lasted 582 sec, after that the orbital unit was injected to the suborbital trajectory.

​The World Radiocommunication Conference 2019 (WRC-19) to be held at Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, from 28 October – 22 November 2019, will address requirements for some of the leading edge technological innovations set to play a pivotal role in tomorrow's digital economy with immense implications for the trillion-dollar telecommunication and ICT industry. It will be preceded by the Radiocommunication Assembly 2019 (RA-19), 21 – 25 October 2019.

Arqiva Group Limited, the leading UK communications infrastructure company, today announces that it has reached an agreement with Cellnex for the sale of its telecoms infrastructure and related assets at an enterprise value of £2.0bn.

The transaction comprises c.7,400 of Arqiva’s cellular sites, including masts and towers as well as urban rooftop sites, and the right to market a further c.900 sites across the UK.

Boeing [NYSE: BA] is investing US$ 20 million in Virgin Galactic, a vertically integrated human spaceflight company. The companies will work together to broaden commercial space access and transform global travel technologies.

ND SATCOM, the premier supplier of and integrator for innovative satellite communication systems and solutions, announced today the acquisition of TECNA located in Dakar, Senegal. This important strategic move will further enhance outreach and interaction between the company and its customers, partners and the leading communication companies in the West Africa region.TECNA Suarl has been renamed ND SatCom SENEGAL.

The Latin America broadband satellite market is growing at a steady rate. These days, it is showing a potential high growth because of higher available capacity. Today, players are competing with low-cost VSAT terminals with the Ku- and Ka-band capacities that focus on Internet and OTT/Video streaming services. These are all brought about by High Throughput Satellites (HTS) satellites entering the region during the last three years.

Long, long ago, when commercial teleport companies were a new thing, they had a terrific business model that offered access to the satellite network.  They leased transponder capacity long-term, sliced and diced it up and served it out to customers – initially for broadcast TV and then for a gradually expanding set of applications from corporate data networks to the internet.  Margins were good and the market was in growth mode.