London-based OneWeb announced on May 10 that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Texas-based TrustComm Inc., which will enable OneWeb to offer its Low Earth Orbit (LEO) network and connectivity services to U.S. government clients and TrustComm customers.
Based at the highly secure Ellington Joint Base in Houston, Texas, TrustComm was established in 1999 as a provider of managed satellite communications and professional services to commercial organizations and governments. TrustComm offers services ranging from broadband Internet access, VoIP and voice, video conferencing and data communications for business continuity to emergency response, tactical field deployment, and temporary use.
“OneWeb’s acquisition of TrustComm underpins our strategy to rapidly scale satellite communications service to the U.S. Department of Defense and other government agencies as they look to integrate high throughput, low latency solutions to meet new connectivity demands,” said OneWeb’s Head of Government Services Dylan Browne. “We are excited to have TrustComm join our team and leverage their strong reputation providing the remote communications our customers want, particularly in Alaska and the Arctic.”
Under the terms of the agreement, a newly acquired proxy subsidiary of OneWeb will be led by TrustComm CEO Bob Roe and focus on introducing OneWeb’s enterprise grade network services to customers. Terms of the transaction are confidential, and it is expected to close in 2021, subject to customary closing conditions including regulatory approvals.
“The TrustComm team is thrilled to be joining OneWeb at the dawn of this new era of satcom services. TrustComm’s heritage and customer-focused support teams will enable us to expand the portfolio of services we offer and allow us to pursue new opportunities. This is an exciting development and we look forward to taking our government business to new heights in the coming year,” said Roe.
OneWeb will offer DoD and other government clients a new suite of services with network speeds up to 195 Mbps, lower latency, smaller and more compact multi-orbit user terminals and built-in network management tools providing substantial economic savings over traditional GEO sales models.
The acquisition follows the successful demonstration of OneWeb’s turnkey satellite-based communications system to the DoD in March of 2021, with data rates up to 500Mbps at latency levels as low as 32ms. The demonstration also illustrated the seamless handover of connectivity between multiple LEO satellites as they passed overhead.
Source: OneWeb
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