Viasat's John Janka on the future of satellite and need for LEO-GEO harmony
3/22/2023WASHINGTON – John Janka, chief officer of global government affairs and regulatory at Viasat, spoke with Light Reading at Satellite 2023 last week about the changing communications landscape and how satellite players and policies must evolve. We also discussed the operator's upcoming launch of its Viasat-3 satellite, which Janka said "should be four-times better performing than the best satellite in orbit today."
Here are some topics covered in this video:
- How and why opportunities for the satellite industry landscape are evolving (0:30)
- What direct-to-device communications means for the industry (2:17)
- Why he's advocating for the "harmonious coexistence of LEOs and GEOs," also known as low-Earth orbit and geostationary orbit satellites (3:15)
- Viasat's participation in and perspective on federal subsidy programs (4:43)
- Best practices and policies for quickly deploying satellite service in emergencies (6:57)
- Details on the coming launch of Viasat-3 (7:58)
For a lightly edited conversation transcript, click the caption button on the video player above.
Related stories and links:
- Amazon will put $10B in Project Kuiper 'before seeing much cash flow,' says exec
- The FCC takes its bureaucracy beyond the stars
- ViaSat-3 satellite completes final integrated satellite test (press release)
- Viasat's fastest downstream speed tier rises to 150 Mbit/s
- The Divide: What Viasat's Evan Dixon wants DC to know about satellite broadband
— Nicole Ferraro, editor, Light Reading, and host of "The Divide" on the Light Reading Podcast.
