HTS Capacity Lease Revenues to Reach More Than US$ 6 Billion by 2025

Paris, France, June 21, 2017-According to Euroconsult's latest report, High Throughput Satellites: Vertical Market Analysis & Forecasts, the total committed investment from the 30 satellite operators in HTS systems has reached nearly $19 billion. Compared to the 36 launches of GEO-HTS systems over the past decade, another ~100 GEO-HTS systems are expected to launch from 2017 to 2025, at an average of 11 launches per year. Of these ~100 GEO-HTS systems, roughly 60 have yet to be officially contracted and are still open to the market.

"After relatively low net additions of HTS supply in 2015 and 2016, due in part to slippage of launch schedules, capacity supply is now set to more than double to nearly 2,000 Gbps by 2018, reaching roughly 3,600 Gbps by 2020," said Brent Prokosh, Senior Consultant at Euroconsult and contributor to the report. "Nevertheless, the growth in GEO-HTS is to be overshadowed by the emergence of non-geostationary (NGSO) constellation projects. NGSO-HTS constellation projects are building momentum, promising massive volumes of capacity supply, low latency and global (or near-global) coverage. While it is highly unlikely that all will come to fruition, NGSO-HTS projects such as the continued expansion of SES' O3b fleet of MEO satellites, OneWeb, SpaceX, Telesat and LeoSat would combine to account for over $20 billion of required investment capital and add upwards of 40 Tbps of supply."

NGSO-HTS demand, anchored by O3b today, is projected to grow at an average pace of over 40% per year as at least one LEO-HTS constellation is anticipated to be built and launched within the forecast period. Total HTS capacity lease revenues are forecasted to reach more than $6 billion by 2025, generating over $36 billion in aggregate revenues over the period. As a sign of strong underlying and elastic demand, this impressive revenue growth is expected to be achieved despite the confluence of factors combining to drive capacity prices substantially lower, including growing supply, long-term bulk contracts and an increasingly commoditized market for telecom network services.

  • Consumer broadband services in North America will remain the single largest driver of HTS demand globally, facilitated by new HTS systems launched, with ~1,200 Gbps of capacity usage by 2025
  • Civil government & enterprise networks should grow at a CAGR of 33% to reach 555 Gbps by 2025, supported by the roll-out of new WIFI community hotspot projects
  • Cellular backhaul & trunking is projected to grow at an even faster pace to reach over 475 Gbps by 2025, dominated by low-cost 3G & 4G backhaul solutions
  • HTS demand in mobility markets (aero & maritime) is foreseen to accelerate from 2016 reaching a combined 480 Gbps of leased capacity by 2025

High Throughput Satellites: Vertical Market Analysis & Forecasts assesses the demand take-up profiles of HTS capacity within seven key vertical markets: Consumer Broadband, Civil Government & Enterprise Networks, Cellular Backhaul & Trunking, Aero In-Flight Connectivity, Maritime, Military Satellite Communications, and Video Services. The report highlights the evolution of HTS systems and architectures over the last decade. In addition, it identifies and assesses the HTS investment plans of all satellite operators. All vertical market forecasts are built bottom-up and provide an overview of projected market take-up by region and system type (GEO-HTS Ka, GEO-HTS Ku, NGSO-HTS) until 2025.