Status of satellite ground segment technologies

There was a panel discussion at the satellite ground segment technologies at the SIA-India organized event on way forward for ground segment.

The chair, K. Rathnakara, Director, Satcom Program Office, ISRO HQ, said we need higher data rates. Flat panel antennae are being developed for satellite apps. HTS ground stations are being shared by SPs. We need to have gateways so they can be shared. The new licensing framework is now here for space-based activities. Talent pool in India can contribute to development and design.

Gaurav Kharod, Managing Sales Director, Intelsat India, and moderator, said the ground segment is at an important stage. Components have also evolved over time.

S. Parameswaran, Planet Aerospace, Ex-Director, MCF, ISRO, said satcom industry has seen many challenges. 2020 saw growth in satcom for ground, etc., at $118.4 billion. Planet Aerospace aims to be consulting firm for next-generation industry leaders. Ground segment comprises of communications and control systems, such as earth stations and gateways, critical infrastructure, and ground and mobile platforms. Ground station networks include connections to earth stations and terrestrial networks, etc. Ground segment also looks at the antenna size, power, redundancy, security, etc. Key parameters include MTBF and MTTR.

Satellites have become smart, and ground segment also needs to be smarter. Smarter ground segment uses modern data analysis tools, optimizes all available resources, and has concurrent operations in a non-intrusive way. We need to manage resources as the demand scales up. There can be grouping of requirements and standardization, and adaptability (using SDR), and affordability and secured ES will be workable options in India.

Jean-Luc Almeida, Ground Segment and Services Product Line Manager, Thales Alenia Space, said there are lot of changes in the satellite industry. Satellite systems today have big difference. There are standard architectures, such as LEO, MEO, and GEO. The ground segment is for the users. We are increasing the frequency of feeder links.

We need the space industry to adapt, in terms of capex reduction, flexibility and performance. Digitalization serves all of these points. For capex reduction, we are merging functions and leveraging ground parts and technology. Flexibility can come via frequency/power, and coverage and ground asset. Performance can be managed with spectrum resource allocation, energy efficiency, regenerative process, optics, etc. We have a complex satellite system architecture. There are VHTS for GEO, and software-defined satellites for GEO, and constellations for MEO/LEO. 5G constellation can emerge from ground technology.

For ground infrastructure and virtualization, there are EO and communication satellites. The next layer is ground transport infrastructure, etc. CO2 reduction is a new trend on all infrastructure. 5G is now part of the satellite systems - direct or indirect. Digitalization has led to shared infrastructure and use of AI for performance. We are focusing on space platform activities and app layer. We are using analytics for decision making. Talking about flat-panel antennae, he said multiple technologies for FPA are looking for price reduction, allowing the mass market access for NGSO.

Dr. Prasad HL Bhat, Chairman and CTO of Astrome Technologies Pvt Ltd, said that the key factors defining a ground terminal include cost, data rate, and power, and new-age requirements, such as multi-beam, high bandwidth mobility, and stronger uplink. SLA is very important for customer adoption. Multi-beam is a requirement for LEOs, and an enhancement for GEOs.

Ground terminal categories are traditional round dishes. The array architecture has now become popular for LEOs. Single element and passive arrays have advantages of low cost and high aperture. However, they cannot be used for MEO/LEO. RF active arrays are used for MEO/GEP and high-bandwidth mobility. However, costs are higher, especially for multi-beam. Baseband/IF active arrays are used for MEO and LEO, with high-bandwidth mobility, large number of beams, and better SLA. However, the cost is higher and there is lesser G/T. There are certain innovations in architecture to reduce costs. Cost is primary for implementing active arrays. Astrome has patented and has patent-pending innovations in baseband active arrays.