A Giant Leap in Satellite Communications

High Speeds, Small Dishes

The high-powered SPACEWAY 3 satellite will enable very high speeds in both directions while using compact, cost-efficient terminals. SPACEWAY 3 will provide a variety of service options to meet every need—with upload speeds as high as 16Mbps and downloads as fast as 30Mbps.

True Point-to-Point Connectivity Via Satellite

While spot beams are not new technology, SPACEWAY 3 has taken them to a whole new level and for a whole new purpose. In the past, spot beams were used to reach areas traditionally outside a normal satellite’s “footprint.” For example, a satellite covering North America might have a spot beam covering Hawaii.

By contrast, SPACEWAY 3 places 780 downlink beams and 112 uplink beams next to each other for its US coverage. Thus SPACEWAY 3 does away with the traditional CONUS beam and spot beam architecture for an all spot beam architecture. Since we can reuse frequencies in spot beams that are non-adjacent to each other, we gain more usable frequency than is available on current satellites. In fact, one SPACEWAY 3 satellite is equivalent to 8-10 satellites built on current technology.

However, to make all those spot beams work as a usable system, another technology was required—the SPACEWAY 3 onboard processor. This processor moves bits from one uplink spot beam to one or more downlink spot beams, showcasing true point-to-point connectivity via satellite. These two technologies working together, along with many other innovations, means the lowest per-bit cost to our customers. SPACEWAY 3—making satellite communications cost-effective.

Demodulation and Remodulation on the Satellite

In order to convert the satellite signals back into digital signals for transport across the onboard processor, SPACEWAY 3 must demodulate the signal and then remodulate it before sending back down to earth.

This remodulation significantly increases the power of the signal, allowing SPACEWAY 3 terminals to be similar in cost to normal VSAT terminals while providing significantly increased performance. SPACEWAY 3—a model of efficiency.

The Most Flexible Satellite Data Platform Available Anywhere

Having digital connectivity on the spacecraft also allows an unprecedented level of control over type of connection being made. This allows SPACEWAY 3 to have many, varying types of services operating on the spacecraft concurrently. Services include: innovative video conferencing using on-demand, constant rate guaranteed bandwidth, frame relay-like services requiring enterprise grade performance, and DSL-like services requiring low-cost non-guaranteed bandwidth. SPACEWAY 3—delivering what our customers need.

Quality

The SPACEWAY 3 satellites’ all digital architecture provides the highest levels of quality and performance. SPACEWAY 3 incorporates a host of advanced techniques to mitigate rain fade, allowing the spacecraft to increase power in areas affected by rain and decrease power in areas which are dry and do not need the extra power.

The very controls put into the system that allow the SPACEWAY 3 system to offer such varied services also serve another key purpose. Those controls allow the system to guarantee bandwidth for services requiring guaranteed bandwidth. SPACEWAY 3—the epitome of quality.

SPACEWAY 3 represents the next generation in satellite communications technology, with approximately 5 to 8 times the capacity of today's Ku-band satellites. SPACEWAY 3 will enable a full-mesh digital IP network that will interconnect with a wide variety of end-user equipment and systems. This North American broadband satellite system will enable a range of innovative applications, enterprise-wide.

The SPACEWAY Mission

SPACEWAY 3 employs high-performance, onboard digital processing, packet switching, and spot beam technology to offer higher broadband speeds, high capacity, bandwidth on demand, and mesh connectivity.

The Point-to-Point Communications

SPACEWAY 3’s revolutionary onboard switching capability enables the satellite to receive, process, and route traffic directly to and from customer locations in a single hop, without using a hub. Onboard switching reduces delay, increases overall transmission efficiency, and enables point-to-point, or mesh, communications directly between customer sites.

Spot Beans

SPACEWAY 3’s unique phased array antenna creates 24 hopping spot beams at 440 Mbps directly where the traffic needs to go.

Frequency Reuse

What is SPACEWAY?

SPACEWAY 3 is a next-generation satellite system whose unique capabilities enables high-speed data networking, and unlocks a wealth of value-added HughesNet services.

Operating in globally-assigned Ka-band spectrum, SPACEWAY 3 employs high-performance, onboard digital processing, packet switching, and spot-beam technology to offer direct site-to-site connectivity at rates of from 512 Kbps up to 16 Mbps.

SPACEWAY 3 combines the traditional advantages of satellite, namely ubiquitous reach and efficient broadcast/multicast, with high data rates and mesh connectivity—to give customers a fast, efficient, flexible, and cost-effective communications solution.

Advanced Technology