SSPI Editorial Team

They are in the news.

They are in your view of the sky. 

They are flying up from Earth by the hundreds and thousands.

In a few years, there could be more than 50,000 satellites on-orbit. 
Most of them will fly low, crossing the sky and covering the Earth with radio waves, cameras and radar. Flying so low, they brush the upper edges of the atmosphere, which gradually slows them until they fall to Earth. 
In their short lifetimes, they connect us, capture information about the Earth and deepen our understanding of the planet we call home.

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The Value Keeps Rising
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There is a place in space where no atmosphere reaches. It’s GEO, where satellites can hover over the equator instead of needing to be tracked across the sky. GEO is the orbit proposed by Arthur C. Clarke in 1945 before the dawn of the satellite age. 
GEO is the perfect place to send one digital signal and have it reach millions of sites simultaneously.

For decades, GEO has delivered TV and phone calls, internet and business networks, communications for military missions, humanitarian camps, remote mines and ships at sea. 
No matter how many new satellites we launch, the value of GEO continues to fly higher. 
With no atmosphere to slow them down, GEO satellites last more than 15 years—about three times longer than low-flying ones. 
Because GEO satellites last so long, companies like Hughes can afford to make them bigger and more powerful. 
Hughes’ new Jupiter 3 satellite is the size of a bus with a wingspan like a commercial airliner. Jupiter 3 will join Jupiter 1 and 2 in delivering broadband to millions
of customers. 
GEO is getting smarter, as well—instead of big, fixed beams, the newest satellites send out hundreds of narrow spotbeams, each delivering its own load of bandwidth. 
New technology allows the satellites to steer their beams automatically in response to demand on the ground, plus steady progress in ground systems squeezes even more capacity out of them every year.

What will the world be like with thousands of satellites on-orbit? It will be a world where the internet goes everywhere... a world where your smartphone connects directly to satellites... a world where billions more people will rise out of poverty because they
are connected. 
That was the dream of Arthur C. Clarke in 1945—a dream of GEO satellites connecting people around the world.

Today, that dream is becoming a reality before our eyes.    Produced by Space & Satellite Professionals International (SSPI). Read more stories and view videos of satellites making a better world at this direct link...