Small geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO) satellites have been an increasingly discussed design trend in the industry, boasting the same regionalized scope as traditional GEO models at a price point reduced by the cost-saving of micronized technology.

It’s a fresh idea at a time when some are worried GEO technologies are being interpreted as stagnant.

Change coming to GEO

At the Satellite 2024 conference held in Washington DC in March, market research firm Northern Sky Research spoke at length of the compounding acceleration of low-Earth orbit (LEO) connectivity expansion, fueled by SpaceX’s Starlink, with Amazon’s Kuiper hot on its heels. Yet, the analysts were keen to emphasize that the sun was not setting on geostationary satellites.

“The days of 25-30 big GEOs ordered every year are gone,” said Christopher Baugh, founder and CEO of Northern Sky Research.

“GEO will coexist with LEO as a multi-orbit option, but it’s out of its heyday,” added Jose Del Rosario, research director at Northern Sky.

They spoke to wider conversations elsewhere at that conference concerning how GEO was adapting to new market realities.

One such revelation has been the exploration of geosynchronous smallsats, like Boeing’s 702X small GEO satellites, the European Space Agency’s SGEO missions with Hispasat 36W-1, and more recently with Astranis’ MicroGEO project and Swissto12’s HummingSat.

While larger geosynchronous powerhouses could aspire to span many transmission wavelengths, multiple beams to serve several applications and customers at once, and various redundancies to ensure continuous operation, the small GEO satellite focuses on more specific applications, often for a singular customer, intending to offer the same throughput and range.

“While LEO satellites offer an impressive amount of broadband capacity with low signal latency, small GEO satellite constellations can offer low-cost connectivity to customers with the lowest cost ground infrastructure,” Mike Kaliski, chief technical officer at Swissto12, a satellite systems developer exploring small GEO, tells DCD. “The future will be built on integrated networks that combine the best services based on a delivery through the combination of LEO, MEO, and GEO assets.”

The modern small GEO satellite

This “small” definition can, and has, been interpreted creatively in the past, though geostationary satellites weighing under a ton are a reasonable benchmark, such as Astranis’ 800kg MicroGEO Omega, which is intended to enable 50 gigabits per second in Ka-band.

“MicroGEO satellites can be built quickly, which means MicroGEOs beat traditional GEOs on price,” Christian Keil, vice president at Astranis, tells DCD. “Their unique, smaller form factor also means they can be dedicated to individual customers, which gives those customers unprecedented flexibility.”

At the Space Symposium this year, Astranis CEO John Gedmark suggested a smaller design was preferable for defense procurers, allowing for a resilient architecture. “No more big, fat, juicy targets,” he said.

The approach appears to apply the proliferated manufacturing sensibilities of the LEO business to GEO, increasing order numbers and speeding up production of more smaller machines, though this move has ramifications for the technology’s longevity.

Keil confirmed MicroGEOs were not being built with compatibility for refueling, presumably ruling out upgrading and repair in the same stroke, preferring to launch new satellites every decade, yet another LEO calling card.

With the geosynchronous regime being the traditional satellite servicing market, this move bets against the formation of that emerging economy.

Omega is set to be completed in 2025 and launch in 2026. The company is still due to launch four of its original model satellites in 2024, beginning its road to launch 100 MicroGEO satellites by 2030.

“Small GEO satellite is a relative term,” explains Jean-Luc Froeliger, SVP of space systems at Intelsat. “Satellites that were built in the 70s and 80s had the same capacity that what we call small GEO today. The technology has progressed so much over the last 50 years that the 70s large GEOs are now the small GEOs of today. With today’s small GEOs we are able to procure and launch satellites that have a similar capacity to the 70s/80s satellites but at a much lower price point.”

Small GEO isn’t a universal economic upgrade, Froeliger adds, but can suit market applications or regional sectors where large investments in GEO don’t make commercial sense, a point Swissto12’s Kaliski agreed upon.

“[Small GEO’s] affordability makes it an option of choice to address regional markets, to replace a large GEO at end-of-life, or to offer secure and sovereign connectivity solutions to small and medium-sized states,” he explains.

With many world governments eager to demonstrate space capability in defense in an increasingly advanced and contested era, a competitive price point could prove effective for selling to smaller states with belligerent neighbors, though many of these players have proved most interested in Earth observation over satellite connectivity.

Small GEOs a new trend?

New technological trends can and have created significant change across the satellite industry, although small GEO has been around for more than five years as geosynchronous operators have continued producing large, high-power, long-life, and upgradable satellites.

Tracking the popularity and progress of the new direction may depend on whom you ask.

“Orders of traditional large GEO satellites have reduced in the last 10 years to a lower level, while at the same time, we see a large demand for this GEO SmallSat class satellite Swissto12 has pioneered with HummingSat,” Swissto12’s Kaliski told us. “The four satellites we have on order from industry-leading operators such as Intelsat and ViaSat/Inmarsat are a testament to the relevance of this new class of GEO satellites.”

HummingSat claims to be a tenth the size of conventional GEO satellites at just over 1.5 cubic meters in volume – loosely half the size of a small car – and 200kg of payload. Though small, this telecommunications payload is supplied with 2kW of power and ought to have an operational life of 15 years.

Swissto12 describes the satellite as serving “a wide range of RF frequencies from L-band to Q/V band … [offering operators] wide-area shaped beams and high-throughput spot beams.” Swissto12 is the first company to sell a GEO SmallSat, their HummingSat model, to established global GEO satellite operators, Kalliski says.

Swissto12 has won contracts from SES-owned Intelsat and ViaSat-owned Inmarsat to build a total of four GEO satellites based on its HummingSat design.

“The complexity of global communications means that we believe many different designs, approaches, and technologies will be needed to continue to meet customer demand in the future,” Mark Dickinson, head of space Systems at Viasat, told us.

Viasat seeks a hybrid space and terrestrial strategy that integrates the best functions of many technologies, which is what they saw in Swissto12.

Satellite-based augmentation services (SBAS) and proprietary 3D printing of radio frequency payload technology, set Swissto12 apart, in Viasat’s eyes, widening the flexibility to adapt to emerging business cases.

“[These advanced technologies] mean [Swissto12] have the capability to underpin [Viasat’s] critical safety services well into the 2040s,” says Dickinson.

A new multi-orbit ecosystem?

While eager to hedge their bets across investments, Dickinson remains adamant that geosynchronous orbit would never lose relevance.

“GEO is simply more effective and cost-efficient,” he says. “That said, Viasat is not anti-LEO or against any orbit. There are benefits to different orbits for different purposes & operating bands. … We stand on the brink of a satellite revolution, with the anticipated influx of new satellites in LEO, we are proactively enhancing our GEO capabilities with terrestrial and non-geostationary orbit (NGSO) solutions to stay ahead in service innovation and differentiation.”

The certainty of multi-orbit integrations across satellite regimes appeared more comprehensive than convictions about small GEO.

Intelsat’s Foreliger believes that the best connectivity solution is multi-orbit.

“While LEO solutions have their advantages, including lower latency, GEO still provides the best economic solution in terms of cost per bit,” he says.

Swissto12’s Kaliski saw this multi-orbit trend playing out at established GEO operators like SES, Eutelsat, and Telesat: SES already owns one of the largest GEO fleets, and has started complementary medium-Earth orbit (MEO) service through the O3B mPower constellation; Eutelsat owns a large fleet of geostationary satellites and has merged with LEO operator OneWeb to hybridize offerings; and Telesat is another GEO player that developing its own LEO constellation Telesat Lightspeed.

“By combining LEO or MEO services, which have high capacity with low signal latency, with GEO, which brings global capacity at the lowest cost, operators can combine the best of both worlds,” Kaliski explains.

Swissto12 is currently focused on assembly, integration, and test activities on HummingSat and hopes to announce upcoming orders after completion.

While consensus appears to be building on the subject of the cost-effectiveness of the small GEO satellite approach, with some operators and manufacturers waiting to see pioneers deliver cost-saving and longevity before they get behind the bandwagon, it appears like a more reliable assumption that the future of GEO will perform in concert with LEO, and multi-orbit networks become more common.