Sateliot is planning a 250-satellite constellation in low Earth orbit to deliver a 5G Internet-of-Things service that is available on any mobile device.
“This [service] means that instead of using complicated and expensive devices like the ones we see today on the market, we could use plain, standard mobile devices — $5 to $10 devices that connect directly to our satellite constellation,” Jaume Sanpera, co-founder and chief executive at Barcelona-based Sateliot, tells Connectivity Business News in the latest episode of “The Dish” podcast.
“With 64 satellites, we’ll start providing a non-real time [messaging] service. This is going to start next year in 2024, but we’ll keep increasing the number of satellites [to enable messaging] in real-time, and this will be in 2025 or the beginning of 2026. That’s when [messages] are going to be in real-time everywhere in the world,” Sanpera says.
Sateliot in April announced the launch of its first 5G Internet of Things standard satellite, the GroundBreaker, aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Last month, Sateliot joined Global System for Mobile Communications Association (GMSA), a mobile operator trade association, enabling it to sign standard roaming agreements with any mobile network operator that is also a GSMA member.
“We need to have a super scalable business model, which is our aim, and we need to be transparent for the mobile network operators,” Sanpera says on why Sateliot decided to join GSMA.
Sateliot has a goal of achieving $1 billion in sales by 2026.