0:00

Satellite communications is a fast-growing industry

0:02

with lots of challenges , But one company

0:05

is leading the way for moving this industry forward

0:07

. Find out more in today's episode Three

0:10

. Two , one

0:12

Engine , full power . Welcome

0:15

to your space journey

0:17

, where we venture into the

0:19

future of space exploration

0:21

. Your journey begins

0:23

now . Thanks

0:29

for joining me today for your space journey . My

0:31

name is Chuck and today we're going to speak with Andreas

0:33

Voight , a leader in the SATCOM industry

0:35

. Andreas has more than 20

0:37

years of experience in the satellite communications

0:39

industry , serving as senior engineer

0:42

for URSTAT and as director

0:44

of SATCOM's Innovations Group , or

0:46

SIG . Formed in

0:48

1997 , SIG is

0:50

an association that promotes innovation

0:52

in the SATCOM industry to

0:55

improve operational efficiency and

0:57

reduce impact , saving time and

0:59

money . It aims to do this

1:01

by encouraging industry cooperation

1:03

at engineering level through meetings

1:05

, events and workshops , lobbying

1:08

regulators and groups and supporting

1:10

innovation projects . Your

1:14

space journey , Andreas

1:17

. Thank you so much for joining me today .

1:20

Yeah , thank you so much for having me . It's

1:22

a pleasure to be with you today .

1:24

Well , i've been looking for this conversation and

1:26

I tell you it's amazing . You have 25

1:28

years of amazing experience in this field and

1:31

I got a kick out of the story you showed with me earlier how

1:33

you installed your first antenna dish when you were just

1:35

16 years old . Can you tell

1:37

us more about where your passion for this field began

1:39

?

1:40

Yeah , absolutely . I was in citizen

1:43

band radio and

1:45

was thinking about these

1:48

satellites and cable television

1:50

which was just a big show in Germany

1:52

at that time coming up . That's

1:56

really something I need to explore a little more

1:58

. So with my bicycle

2:01

and the radio I went up to some hills

2:03

looking for frequencies

2:05

and whatever . And then I came along The

2:10

situation of my neighbors who

2:13

had a satellite dish already on

2:15

their house but they

2:17

wanted to swap over to

2:19

cable television and they asked me

2:21

hey , andreas , can you help me getting

2:23

that dish from the roof ? I

2:25

asked just nonchalantly , can

2:28

I have it ? afterwards And they said , yeah

2:30

, for sure , for free . If you take

2:32

it off the roof it's yours . So

2:35

, bingo , i got my first satellite dish

2:37

and due to the magazines which I have

2:39

been consulting , i saw that

2:41

one of the at that time

2:43

new satellites , ecs-4 , which

2:45

is now known as Udall's at 104

2:48

, has been positioned in October

2:50

, just in that month when it happened

2:52

, on the 13 degrees

2:54

prime position which is now known

2:56

as the Hotbird position of Udall's at , and

3:00

started with some analog

3:02

transmissions 42 dB watts

3:04

in KU bands over the 1.2

3:06

meter and analog transmission . If

3:10

you got a spike-free picture

3:12

then it was absolutely fine . You

3:14

just have to know that the LMBs at that time were

3:16

something like 4.5 , 4.85

3:19

, 5.5 dB of noise

3:21

figure in comparison to 0.2 in

3:23

these days . So what

3:26

a difference . It was an interesting

3:29

thing and it hooked me for life . Yes

3:31

, i agree .

3:32

See , i think you mentioned Udall's that , because

3:34

I think it's also amazing you've got these

3:36

two amazing positions right now , udall's

3:39

that you mentioned . let's

3:41

start with that . Can you tell us a little bit more about what Udall's

3:43

that is and your role with it ?

3:46

Yeah , udall's , that is one of

3:48

the big geostationary

3:50

satellite operators worldwide

3:53

, next to other companies , and

3:56

we are here in the middle of a telecommunication

3:59

period at the moment And that means

4:01

that we are moving from the

4:05

broadcast dominated turnover

4:08

value of what Udall's had over

4:11

the last decades into

4:13

a connectivity environment . We

4:15

see that broadcast gets lower in

4:17

business numbers . Connectivity

4:19

is picking up because everybody

4:21

would like to have a satellite

4:24

internet connection or a mobile

4:26

connection in closed user

4:29

networks civil , military

4:31

, governmental , as you like And

4:35

that means very clearly that

4:37

we need to adapt ourselves how we are working

4:40

And that's why we have developed

4:42

some super

4:44

powerful new satellites which are put

4:46

into service , like Connect , vhts

4:48

, e10b , new

4:50

Flexart for the Americas , or our

4:53

Starship called Chromtum , which

4:55

is a completely innovative , flexible

4:57

and satellite

4:59

that even has a customer

5:02

cockpit . So the satellite operator

5:05

is a task of

5:07

designing footprints or whatever is given

5:09

to the customer , because the customer can actually

5:12

go ahead and design their

5:14

own footprints due to their own needs

5:16

Or , as we all

5:18

know , with certain restrictions

5:20

in certain environments , because we're

5:22

not alone in the space , but

5:24

that does the software all by itself and

5:27

helps our customers to go to missions . And

5:31

whatever it is , it's a cruise ship in the Mediterranean

5:33

, or it's a plane that flies

5:36

over the ocean and would like to

5:38

have follow me connectivity

5:40

all possible .

5:42

So that's amazing . And not

5:45

only that , but you also find the

5:47

time I don't know how you do it to be the director

5:49

of the SACCOM innovation group . Can

5:51

you tell us more about just SIG in general

5:53

?

5:54

Yeah , sig is a combination

5:57

out of all of the different

5:59

satellite operators . That

6:01

is the history of

6:03

SIG , but it also contains

6:05

a lot of companies who

6:07

are providing software and hardware solutions

6:09

for the industry and

6:12

, for sure , also research centers

6:14

and universities or companies

6:17

who would like to bring a

6:19

certain value for the industry into

6:21

it , and we're combining it . So that

6:23

means in conferences

6:25

, workshops , and the next

6:27

one is , for example , going

6:30

to be in the satellite show in

6:32

Washington That is parallel

6:36

to it , let me say it like this And that

6:39

means we are going

6:41

to speak about new developments

6:43

and me being the leader of the

6:45

AI working group inside satellite

6:48

innovations group . It is something

6:50

that is very important because here

6:52

certain things that also touch you all

6:54

that come all together . We're

6:56

talking about digitalization of our

6:58

environment and service operations , and

7:01

that means very clearly that we

7:03

do not have the strict

7:05

hierarchy anymore where

7:07

the manager is on top and does

7:10

just the person environments

7:13

. No , when we are having artificial

7:15

intelligence and machine learning , also

7:18

, the manager needs to understand the technology

7:20

of that religious change

7:23

, what we have in the control centers

7:25

in the service operation fields . Why

7:27

is that ? Because , first of all , in

7:29

the 80s and the 90s , we have been RF

7:32

control centers . Then we

7:34

had to add IT stuff into

7:36

it for ticketing , for ETL

7:38

environment , for dealing

7:41

with customer portals

7:43

and so on . But now , with the third

7:45

thing which is coming up and

7:48

that is mathematics and

7:50

customer centric behavior

7:52

, that is something that

7:54

is 100% clear

7:57

. Now , something new in

8:00

the environment what we would like to have

8:02

, what

8:05

do we need to understand when we use

8:07

artificial intelligence and machine learning ? We

8:09

need to understand first of all , the

8:11

question we want to ask . We

8:13

need to understand the mathematical

8:16

procedure which comes after the

8:18

question , with all of the manual tasks

8:20

we would like to optimize . Then

8:23

we need to understand also the

8:25

answer which is coming out of

8:27

the machine processing

8:30

, because it gives us , for example

8:32

, in result

8:34

, 72%

8:37

. It is probable that

8:39

this is the solution . What

8:43

does 72% actually mean

8:45

? We are having in the control

8:48

centers people who are

8:50

RF engineers , who have a very good IT

8:52

understanding and have also studied

8:56

mathematics , physics and

8:58

so on . That is fine , but

9:01

between frequencies

9:03

, between bandwidths

9:05

, between handling environments

9:09

, we need to understand , and make

9:11

them understand what these mathematical

9:13

probabilities are going to be and what it actually

9:16

means . That is something like a training

9:18

that I am doing as well

9:21

with our guys . That is what I

9:23

am also giving

9:26

as speeches in the conferences of

9:28

SIG Forward in

9:30

the environment how to digitalize

9:32

, how to go ahead and make the

9:37

life for the

9:39

control centers , for the satellite operators

9:41

, better in that particular sense .

9:44

Andre , i said it's amazing . I think

9:46

it's really incredible that you're leading the AI efforts

9:48

for that And you've obviously

9:51

been in this field long enough to see these changes

9:53

, from when you're 16 years old to now

9:55

Just

9:57

52 , it's okay . Yeah

9:59

, exactly , not

10:02

too long . What are some of the challenges

10:04

, if you can say I know there's so

10:06

many of them out there but what are the challenges that you've seen

10:08

us overcome so far

10:10

, that you've seen solutions put in place over

10:12

these years ?

10:14

So , first of all , inside you

10:17

do that for sure When

10:19

you are running the

10:22

CSE , our communication systems control

10:25

center then you have to deal

10:27

with changes , with incidents

10:29

, with problems on an everyday

10:31

basis , and here

10:33

it is important that you have knowledge

10:35

, training and

10:38

passing

10:40

information between each other

10:42

. And , especially , due to

10:44

follow the sun environments

10:47

, we have to deal with several

10:49

control centers that run in parallel along

10:52

how the sun moves

10:54

, and the documentation

10:57

, the interchange between

10:59

support teams , between level one and

11:01

level two environments , is extremely

11:04

important And that

11:06

is how we need to train

11:11

and make the people understand what

11:13

is actually necessary to do . In

11:15

SIG it is a little bit different

11:18

, for sure , because it's dis-coupled from

11:20

the customer relationship as

11:22

SIG , with the different companies

11:24

working together , we are talking there

11:26

about technical issues that

11:29

we are experiencing between

11:32

each other or globally

11:34

together . So , for

11:36

example , if you have somebody

11:38

transmitting a very strong signal , not

11:40

only on one satellite , but maybe because

11:42

of the antenna or the power

11:45

things that are ongoing

11:47

on three or four

11:49

satellites of different satellite operators

11:52

, then SIG is exactly

11:54

that particular safe

11:57

haven where we can talk

11:59

about that in the technical coordination

12:02

with each other , without

12:04

sharing customer information for sure , because

12:06

that is something that is important to

12:08

be a company secret , but

12:11

to engineer a technical

12:13

solution together , to coordinate

12:15

between the satellite

12:18

operators and maybe even act

12:20

all together . We

12:23

do individual geolocations , for

12:25

example , that we can find out where the interference

12:28

is coming from , and if , for

12:30

example , company one is

12:32

having that result , it is confirmed by company

12:35

two , by company three and even

12:37

by company four , with four different

12:39

individual measurements , and

12:41

then sends to the regulatory

12:44

body of the country where

12:46

the emitter is coming from . Then

12:48

that is for sure something which is much

12:51

more powerful , as if one

12:53

operator is doing that by

12:55

himself .

12:56

Andreas , let me ask you this . I'm just thinking as we're

12:58

talking . You know there's , you know

13:00

, thousands of satellites going up . Now there's

13:02

companies put up their own constellations . You know we have SpaceX

13:05

, starlink , we have , we got one web

13:07

, we've got . How has that impacted the

13:09

industry as well ? I know there are different frequency

13:11

, obviously , but still a lot more traffic

13:13

, a lot more communications going on . How is that affecting

13:15

SATCOM right now ?

13:17

Yeah , the combination of UtilSat

13:19

and OneWeb is going to be something which is extremely

13:21

important for UtilSat and the telecommunication

13:24

pivot we are going to have for the

13:26

connectivity branch

13:28

of our company

13:30

. And , for sure , in

13:33

SIG we have been having a look

13:35

very carefully

13:37

. What kind of potential

13:40

incidents can there be ? Is

13:43

it possible that the

13:46

Leo orbit is getting very

13:48

crowded and with all of the satellites

13:51

there that we are going to have

13:53

conjunction events that are

13:55

seen as

13:57

critical by us conventional

14:00

geo-satellite operators ? Is

14:02

it possible that

14:04

we are going to have uplink

14:07

and downlink interference

14:09

, as the frequency ranges

14:11

are shared ? And here we have

14:13

to say most

14:16

of the Leo

14:18

operators have actually done

14:20

their job , that they have signed

14:22

, while taking

14:24

the license from FCC

14:26

, from the local regulator , where

14:28

they are applying to not to interfere

14:31

geo-synchronous orbit satellites

14:34

, and they have implemented inhibit

14:37

zones not to transmit

14:39

in the direction of geostationary satellites

14:41

. So , therefore , that

14:44

communication band is shared between

14:46

us and the Leo operators

14:48

and up to now we

14:51

have not seen any interference

14:55

introduced by one of

14:57

the Leo operators at all . For

15:00

sure we have seen interferences

15:02

between the Leo operators . That

15:05

is something that needs to be discussed , but

15:08

with regards to the

15:10

standard satellite

15:13

operators in geo-synchronous orbit . That

15:15

is not going to happen . Now

15:18

we need to understand also how the satellite

15:21

constellations are going to be flown or

15:23

are organized in orbit . Here

15:26

we need to understand that

15:29

you cannot fly 5,000

15:31

, 10,000 , 20,000 , 100,000

15:34

satellites in the same way as

15:36

you fly 40 satellites , as

15:39

we do in neutral Z in

15:41

geo-synchronous arc For

15:44

geo-stationary satellites . You

15:46

have one computer . It looks

15:48

after it , there is an

15:50

alarm , the satellite control center

15:53

answers it

15:55

or just acknowledges

15:57

the action that needs to be done and

16:00

everything is fine . Therefore

16:02

, also , as it is very far away

16:05

from Earth , so it's . The

16:07

geo-stationary orbit

16:09

is exactly 35,786

16:13

kilometers above the equator . Therefore

16:17

the distances

16:19

we are talking about is large

16:21

. That means also

16:23

that if one

16:26

of these 70 or

16:29

50-meter big

16:31

or wide satellites are coming

16:33

close to each other , the

16:36

orbital area

16:38

where it is living

16:40

in is something like a cube of 50

16:42

, 60 , 70 kilometers . If

16:45

a satellite comes close to the other one , we

16:48

are measuring it in tens of kilometers

16:50

, or if it is coming 10 kilometers

16:52

close , then it's already an issue

16:54

. That's a completely

16:57

different story for Leo operators

16:59

. Leo operators need

17:01

to fly the

17:03

satellites with artificial intelligence

17:05

, with the

17:07

environment that they can control the

17:09

satellites and give commands and updates

17:12

when they are overflying one of the gateway stations

17:14

to control the satellites , and that

17:16

file must be valid for the next

17:18

24

17:22

hours , or something like this . Also

17:24

, all of the satellites which I

17:26

know of have GPS

17:29

receivers on board , so they know absolutely

17:32

where they are And they

17:34

know also what kind

17:36

of speed they have , what kind of distance

17:38

they have to others , because they can

17:40

communicate with each other . So

17:42

when you have a look in certain webpages

17:44

or analysis and so on , it

17:47

is not very uncommon

17:49

that there are conjunctions

17:51

, events of 500 meters

17:53

between Leo satellites without

17:56

any question , and nothing

17:58

has happened yet , luckily

18:01

, because we all know about Tesla

18:03

effect and so on , like

18:05

the thing which is happening in nuclear

18:07

power plants of nuclear

18:10

fission . So if there

18:13

is one accident in the orbit , it

18:16

might be game over for that level , because

18:20

all of the tiny little pieces

18:22

that satellite

18:24

collision produces can

18:26

for sure provoke then

18:29

something like a mousetrap

18:31

effect that pushes

18:34

the tiny little pieces further

18:37

into more satellites which explode

18:39

as well and so on , and then we have a

18:41

cloud based environment

18:43

which is debris but

18:45

not satellites , and that is for

18:47

sure what the industry doesn't want . Just

18:51

think about to launch

18:53

satellites into geostationary orbits

18:55

or to higher services like GPS

18:57

or whatever kind of thing . We need to go

18:59

through Leo orbits as

19:01

well , and if there's a

19:03

cloud of debris where we want to

19:05

launch through , the

19:07

possibility of having

19:09

a launch failure or an impact in the

19:11

launcher body is quite high

19:13

then . So we better avoid

19:16

that And luckily

19:18

the operators of the Leo

19:21

satellites have found a solution And

19:24

we have to trust in

19:27

them and for sure also

19:29

check out all of the possibilities

19:31

. One of the SIG

19:33

members which

19:35

we have is Valentin

19:37

Eder from Space Analysis . He

19:41

is actually having

19:43

a calculation software at the moment

19:45

, in coordination with

19:47

the European Space Agency , coming

19:50

up that will show us these

19:53

kinds of events of

19:56

conjunction analysis

19:58

, and not only about

20:00

conjunction analysis between the satellites but

20:03

also conjunction analysis for

20:05

IF purposes . So

20:07

that means whenever we

20:09

have the same

20:12

environment of a link

20:15

between ground station geostationary satellites

20:17

and the low orbit satellite just passes

20:20

through , then we might

20:22

have an interference event , but

20:24

the more we check

20:26

the less we get

20:28

it . These are just

20:30

non-events . Nevertheless

20:33

, we better need

20:35

to be safe than sorry , absolutely

20:37

, andres .

20:38

I kind of want to expound

20:41

on that a little bit , sort

20:43

of wrap this up with one last question into

20:45

the fun part of aspects of what

20:47

drew you to this field . Again Pitching yourself as

20:50

that 16-year-old getting your satellite

20:52

dish for the first time , your hands on it . There

20:54

are other people out there . I know we have listeners out there that

20:56

are into HEM radio or wanting

20:58

to get into it just as amateurs . Do

21:01

you have any advice for them to

21:03

get into this field ?

21:05

Well , satellites and antennas

21:07

to install them . Today

21:09

, because of the powerful satellites , what

21:11

we have , that's not really

21:14

very much difficult

21:16

to do , but you need to understand certain

21:20

few basics that

21:22

you would like to have

21:24

with . So , first of all , when

21:26

dealing with satellite communications , it's quasi-optical

21:29

transmission . Quasi-optical

21:31

transmission means when you put

21:34

a piece of paper , a building , a

21:36

tree or whatever in between the satellite

21:38

and your satellite dish , you will not receive

21:40

anything , or your reception

21:42

will be so much impaired that

21:44

the quality might be bad , or

21:46

you don't see anything . So therefore

21:49

, see you guys , that

21:52

is the premise of what you

21:54

need to do . If you're

21:56

in the northern hemisphere , the satellites

21:59

geostationary ones are

22:01

always in the southern

22:03

rim . So , as

22:05

the satellites are all positioned

22:08

over the geostationary

22:10

arc , because that is the only arc

22:13

where the satellite , in angle

22:15

velocity , has the same

22:17

rotational speed as the

22:19

Earth itself , that's why it stays

22:21

at one point over the equator

22:23

And that's why you need an antenna

22:26

that is not motorized . You can fix it with

22:28

a pole in the ground and point it to

22:30

a geostationary satellite And that's

22:32

it , and you can see signals . Then

22:36

, for sure , some of the signals , broadcast

22:38

signals and I have been speaking about

22:40

broadcast and connectivity

22:42

podcast will always be there

22:44

. Some people say our

22:46

podcast will go away or whatever . No , no

22:49

, the part of broadcast

22:51

that might

22:53

see a change over , like

22:56

a pay TV systems and so on

22:58

. That's 100% clear . But

23:01

countries would like to have their

23:04

political messages sent and

23:06

their information by

23:08

the president and public

23:10

television communicated

23:13

outside to the world , and that's why satellite

23:16

is going to be surviving in

23:18

broadcasting And therefore

23:21

I do . Amateurs , people

23:24

on the ground who would like to see something

23:26

very special . They still have to rely

23:28

on satellite dishes next

23:31

to their internet connection , which is maybe not

23:33

always available . But

23:35

the satellite

23:37

environment , like KONUS beams in

23:40

the US , pan-european beams over

23:42

Africa , europe , the

23:44

Arabian environment , asia

23:47

Pacific and so on , these

23:49

are for sure available And

23:51

you point a dish

23:54

on one of the satellites carrying these TV

23:57

programs And in most of the cases

23:59

you are able to see that in the clear

24:01

, because none of these

24:03

countries who would like to

24:06

provide information about the country itself

24:08

are going to encrypt these signals

24:10

in broadcasting . So therefore , with

24:12

a digital receiver

24:15

that is up for that particular region

24:18

or country , here in Europe

24:20

it's mostly DVBS

24:22

and DVBS2 or

24:24

future more if

24:27

it's going a little bit also into the internet

24:30

connectivity handling DVBS2X

24:32

In America and

24:34

Asia . Some of the countries have

24:36

different environments But

24:39

still they're available in

24:41

the supermarket , in

24:43

whatever kind of electronic

24:46

platform over the internet And

24:48

you can buy that thing and install

24:51

it . And you need

24:53

to understand that a

24:55

frequency is normally used

24:58

twice in satellite communication . That is

25:00

called polarization . We

25:02

have vertical and horizontal polarization

25:04

. If it is linear , or right hand or

25:06

left hand circulation , that's

25:08

polarization if it is circular And

25:11

that does normally the electronic

25:13

converter you have with your antenna with

25:16

you . Nevertheless , when you are

25:18

in linear polarization you need

25:20

to set up that particular

25:22

tiny little L&B low-noise

25:24

block amplifier . In that

25:26

way the two polarizations

25:29

are received independently

25:31

. That is something that comes on top

25:33

of the peaking of the antenna to

25:35

find the satellite And then normally

25:37

with the cable pay attention

25:40

, there's direct current on the cable . You

25:42

need not to produce it short when manufacturing

25:44

the cables . Best is to buy one

25:46

that is already in the box

25:48

or something like this connect your

25:51

receiver , which is

25:54

in most of the cases even pre-programmed

25:56

, you plug it into the television set and

25:58

off you go .

26:00

It's fastening your vice and dress For those again wanting

26:02

to get in the field . It's so

26:04

addictive . Again , it's a fascinating

26:06

field . Andreas , i just want to thank you

26:08

for just all the work that you do with

26:10

the EuroSat and SIG And just want to

26:12

thank you for taking time to join us today . Really do appreciate

26:14

it .

26:16

Yeah , thank you very much . And to all of

26:18

my Ham radio friends

26:20

out there , this is FoxSort for Juliet Kilo

26:22

Hotel and 73s to all you all .

26:26

Your space journey . Well

26:29

, I really enjoyed my conversation with Andreas today And I'm excited

26:31

about the future of satellite communications

26:33

, the fast growing industry . If you'd like to learn

26:35

more about SIG , just go to

26:37

their website at satigspace

26:40

. I want to thank Andreas for joining

26:42

me today . I want to thank you for joining me as well . Again

26:45

, if you give me a small favor and share this episode with

26:47

a friend , I'd certainly appreciate it . Thanks so much

26:49

for joining me . I'll see you next time . God bless

26:51

.