Viasat Moves Closer to Offering Advanced Internet Service With Satellite Reaching Orbit

Viasat‘s highest capacity communications satellite, ViaSat-2, has successfully arrived in geostationary orbit and will allow delivery of advanced residential, enterprise, government and in-flight internet services starting in February.

The satellite launched in June. Within days of reaching its geostationary orbit, the Viasat team was successfully transmitting data to and from the satellite, as well as streaming content providing an early demonstration of the satellite’s power and flexibility.

Cody Catalena, Viasat’s president of global business solutions, tells Channel Partners that ViaSat-2 was designed to offer high-capacity connectivity and wide coverage, with the flexibility to move capacity to where demand requires it.

Viasat’s Cody Catalena

“We expect the Viasat-2 satellite will enable us to offer business plans coast to coast with greater speeds, and there will (be) many areas where we expect to deliver download speeds up to 100 Mbps,” he said. “This will enable our partners to offer even faster internet services across a broader footprint. In addition to the business plans that will be available in the channel, the ViaSat-2 satellite will enable us to support other lines of business that cater to the following regions: North America, Central America, the Caribbean and a portion of northern South America, as well as the primary aeronautical and maritime routes across the Atlantic Ocean between North America and Europe.”

With this expanded coverage and capacity, Viasat expects to offer a variety of affordable high-speed business internet service options for primary connectivity, as well as satellite internet back-up plans, Catalena said.

“Our continuity service packages will offer businesses access to a redundant connection to avoid service interruptions during outages when their primary internet service provider is unavailable,” he said. “Additionally, we will be nationwide — so businesses can tap into Viasat internet — even in the hardest to reach locations.”

Viasat will be announcing new competitive service plans in 2018.

“This is a great achievement for the Viasat team, our customers and our partners,” said Mark Dankberg, Viasat’s chairman and CEO. “The ViaSat-2 system is the culmination of years of hard work and commitment to bringing a satellite platform to market that can deliver truly high-speed, high-quality broadband to many more people, and with a much greater geographic reach. We’re another step closer to bringing the ViaSat-2 satellite into service.”