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Satellites
GHANA
“The space sector is growing everywhere – including Africa”
Photo: Adobe Stock
A recently announced partnership between Viasat and the Ghana Space Science and Technology Institute (GSSTI) brought the ground-station-as-a-service (GSaaS) business model to Ghana. John Williams of Viasat explains why this is significant.
Viasat’s first Real-Time Earth facility in Africa is located in Accra.
V
IASAT, A GLOBAL communications company, recently announced the launch of its first Real-Time Earth (RTE) facility in Africa, located in Accra, Ghana. Here’s an extract from the announcement made late last year. “Viasat worked in partnership with the Ghana Space Science and Technology Institute (GSSTI), a government-based institution under the Ghana Atomic Energy Commission (GAEC), focused on coordinating all space, science, technology and related activities in Ghana, to bring new space opportunities and jobs to the region, while expanding Viasat's ability to deliver critical earth observation and remote sensing data on-demand around the world. With this new station, Viasat’s RTE global network is now active in five continents. “Viasat RTE provides Ground-Station-as-aService (GSaaS) capabilities in support of environmental, insurance, shipping, energy and government operations. This is a fullymanaged, affordable ground network that supports next-generation and legacy geosynchronous equatorial orbit (GEO), medium earth orbit (MEO) and low earth orbit (LEO) satellites using the S-, X-, and Ka-bands, enabling operators to meet current and future data requirements. “Viasat's RTE satellite ground station facility is located at the Ghana Radio Astronomy Observatory, Kuntunse. It includes a Viasat fullmotion 7.3M S/X/Ka-band antenna and
28 Communications Africa Issue 1 2022
associated infrastructure. The antenna is currently ready to provide global satellite operators the ability to perform telemetry, tracking and command (TT&C) capabilities as well as rapidly download, stream and/or disseminate valuable satellite-based data in a timely and secure manner.” That’s the quite extraordinary story that we heard back in November last year. But what’s the background? We asked John Williams, vice president, Real-Time Earth at Viasat, to give us some more information on this ground-breaking initiative now under way in Ghana.
“The RTE ground station is helping to cultivate interest in space for the region.” Communications Africa (CAF): Could you tell us more about your RTE global network? What services does it offer? John Williams, vice-president, Real-Time Earth at Viasat: Viasat Real-Time Earth is a global ground segment-as-a-service (GSaaS) offering that provides a means for satellite operators to communicate with their satellites without having the expense and maintenance of building out their own antenna network. RTE fields our own Viasat antenna technology with 7.3m S/X/Ka-band antennas as the baseline. Typical customers include commercial remote
sensing companies engaged in taking various types of imagery of Earth. That imagery is then downlinked over Viasat RTE antennas and transmitted directly to the satellite owner’s endpoint of choice. CAF: Why Ghana? Is it to do with the country’s position on the map, government support, local technical capabilities or something else? JW: All of the items listed were contributing factors to our build-out in Ghana. Geographically, it provides a great location to quickly downlink satellite imagery taken over Europe and North and West Africa. It is also ideal for satellites in equatorial orbits. Politically, the government has been very supportive. They have a nascent but thriving space sector and the RTE ground station is helping to cultivate interest in space for the region. Finally, our partner Ghana Space Science and Technology Institute (GSSTI) offers technical antenna expertise and brings years of experience through its partnership with the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory and the SKA antenna collocated at the Kutunse site with the RTE antenna. CAF: What does GSSTI bring to this partnership? JW: GSSTI brings a passion for growing the space industry in Ghana, technical expertise and indispensable local area knowledge.
www.communicationsafrica.com
