Market Trends of Satellite IoT Communication Industry
Low Earth Orbit (LEO) drives the Growth of the Satellite IoT Communication
- Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite constellations, which orbit between 160 and 2000 kilometers above the Earth, are potentially attractive for expanding 5G connectivity to isolated, underserved, and remote geographies where terrestrial coverage is absent. Only about 10 % of the Earth's surface has access to terrestrial connectivity services, which leaves a significant opportunity for satellite IoT communications on the LEO constellations.
- LEO satellites attract significant investment from major players due to their adaptability, affordability, advanced mechanics, and ease of assembly and launch. The satellites have a short lifecycle and are mass-produced. There is a significant demand for low-cost, high-speed internet in the government and commercial sectors like retail, banking, oil, and gas. Also, the need for internet access in rural areas among individual consumers in emerging countries is driving investments in LEO constellations.
- LEO are better suited to low-power communications and lower signal propagation losses, reducing the user equipment's power requirements and making it ideal for contact with low-power IoT devices. Today, most of the LEO satellites for IoT are built mainly for leveraging CubeSat technology, allowing companies to mass-produce components and provide commercial off-the-shelf parts, drastically reducing the cost and time to design and develop satellites. It has become the desired option for incumbent satellite operators and NewSpace start-ups launching satellite IoT communication services.
- Moreover, to increase their consumer base and better meet their demands across various applications, significant companies are also investing, merging with other businesses, and investing in new projects. For instance, in April 2023, Sateliot, the first company to operate a low-Earth orbit (LEO) nanosatellite constellation with 5G-IoT standard, introduced Sateliot_0 "The GroundBreaker," the first-ever 5G standard LEO satellite, to democratize access to the Internet of Things.
- In February 2023, Rivada Space Networks GmbH (RSN), an entirely owned subsidiary of U.S.-based Rivada Networks, Inc., engaged Terran Orbital's wholly owned subsidiary Tyvak Nanosatellite Systems, Inc. to manufacture 300 low-earth-orbit (LEO) satellites for Rivada's innovative "network in the sky." RSN's space-based data network will provide fiber-like low latency and gigabit-per-second data delivery which is ultra-secure and extremely resilient.
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North America is Expected to Hold Largest Share
- North America holds a significant share of the Satellite IoT Communication market. The growth is attributed to the growing government spending on military and communication networks. The presence of key significant players, such as Honeywell International, Inc., General Dynamics Corporation, L3Harris Technologies Corporation, and many others, drive the market growth significantly across the region.
- 5G networks play a vital role in assisting policymakers and governments in transforming cities into smart cities, allowing inhabitants to participate and realize socioeconomic benefits from an advanced, digital, data-intensive economy. As a result, authorities would be required to build and upgrade passive assets, such as fiber networks and data centers, which strive to meet the demand for the satellite IoT Communication Market.
- Moreover, the rise in the demand from end-user industries, such as government, agriculture, mining, energy, maritime, and aviation, is enhancing the market growth in the region. Moreover, the region has improved network connectivity and advanced foothold technological infrastructure. For instance, In August 2022, Inmarsat and hiSky created a new scalable IoT solution to provide a cost-efficient offering to IoT adopters while improving connectivity.
- In June 2023, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. declared two modem chipsets with satellite capability: the Qualcomm 9205S Modem and the Qualcomm 212S Modem. The new Qualcomm modem chipsets primarily power off-grid industrial use cases that need a standalone non-terrestrial network (NTN) connectivity or hybrid connectivity alongside terrestrial networks and enable IoT developers, enterprises, OEMs, and ODMs to harness the key real-time information and insights especially to manage various business projects.
- Also, in December 2022, Iridium Communications Inc. declared the service launch of Iridium Messaging TransportSM, a two-way cloud-native networked data service primarily optimized for use over Iridium Certus and built to make it easier to combine satellite connections to the existing or new IoT solutions. IMT delivers an IP data transport service unique to the Iridium network, built for small-to-moderate messages assisting satellite IoT applications. Integrated with Iridium CloudConnect and Amazon Web Services, the new service can minimize the development costs and the speed time to market for various new Iridium Connected® IoT devices.
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