The FCC likely will again deny Dish Network and designated entities SNR Wireless and Northstar Wireless bidding credits, and Dish likely will have to again head to court, New Street Research analyst Jonathan Chaplin emailed investors Thursday evening. He said despite the loosened Dish control of the DEs (see 1804040004), the company faces "seemingly anti-Dish stance" by the FCC. If the agency rules against the Dish DEs, they likely will sue, with the issue ultimately not getting resolved until 2020 or 2021, he said. If the DEs succeed, the question becomes whether the DEs can reclaim the relinquished AWS-3 spectrum licenses without any further payments, he said.

ThinKom Solutions and Comsat jointly tested and validated continuous high-speed satellite communications in a moving vehicle under a range of conditions, they said Thursday. They said the 5,000-mile demonstration used a roof-mounted ThinKom phased-array satellite antenna on an SUV, while Comsat provided connectivity using commercial Ku-band satellites and terrestrial networks. They said the vehicle will be in Washington over the coming months for demos.

Despite hype about connected car market opportunities for satellite-based flat panel antennas, that FPA market "remains elusive and still many years away from being realized," Northern Sky Research analyst Dallas Kasaboski blogged Wednesday. Successful deployment for FPA manufacturers could be lucrative, but the use cases are poorly defined and the technology and price points haven't reached levels that would open the door to widespread adoption, he said. Other land-mobile FPA applications like connected buses and trainers are further along, he said, estimating cumulative equipment revenues for land-mobile FPA applications to hit $94 million over the next decade.

The FCC should make clear in a policy statement that earth stations in motion operations can be licensed in spectrum currently used by Iridium when an ESIM applicant demonstrates those operations won't have a significant effect on Iridium's licensed and actual feeder link operations. That's the position taken by Inmarsat, SES and ViaSat in a docket 17-95 filing posted Wednesday. It said the record makes clear ESIM operations can share spectrum with Iridium's feeder link operations. The three said when such a showing can't be made, the applicant could pursue an ESIM license through good faith coordination requirements and under Section 25.258 of FCC rules on non-geostationary orbit feeder link stations and geostationary services in the 29.25-29.5 GHz band. The companies said such an approach "would ensure that unused spectrum is not held hostage to an otherwise protracted coordination process." Iridium didn't comment.

Pointing to unspecified NOAA "restrictions," SpaceX cut short live video streaming of a Friday Falcon 9 rocket launch carrying a set of Iridium Next satellites. The company emailed it stopped the video streaming just before second-stage engine shutdown. It said it was "working with NOAA to address these restrictions" with the goal of resuming live streaming from orbit in the future. The video feed from the company's publicized "Starman" launch in February was potentially in violation of NOAA rules on remote space sensing systems (see 1803160037). NOAA didn't comment Friday. Iridium said Friday the company passed a million subscribers. It said the $3 billion constellation should be complete later this year, with three more launches planned.

O3b filed a $1.67 million bond with the FCC for 26 additional satellites operating in two more frequencies and for two more orbital planes to be added to its constellation. The bond, posted Wednesday, says the company -- part of SES -- commits to having at least 50 percent of its satellites authorized by the agency in operation no later than Feb. 28, 2024. The O3b request -- for additional satellites to be granted U.S. market access, but that number reduced from what it originally had sought OK for (see 1801100044) -- was granted in part last month.

Boeing and Greg Wyler's SOM1101 don't have any "understanding or agreement" about Boeing's future involvement in the two non-geostationary satellite system applications it wishes to hand off to SOM1101, Boeing company officials told FCC International Bureau staff according to an ex parte filing posted Tuesday. But Boeing said it hopes to continue to be the manufacturer of those proposed satellites and would be able to support SOM1101 if such an agreement were reached. Multiple other prospective NGSO operators opposed the Boeing/SOM1101 transfer (see 1802130019).

Satellite life extension and high-value salvage missions are "a solid near-term market opportunity" for emerging in-orbit servicing providers, Northern Sky Research analyst Carolyn Belle blogged Tuesday. NSR said it predicts servicing contract revenue to reach a cumulative $3 billion by 2027. It said 240 satellites are expected to reach end of life in the next decade, with 90 of them estimated to be candidates for servicing. And it said robotics opens the door to significant long-term potential in the form of fixing mal-deployed antennas and solar arrays, though those offerings will be slow to develop since satellites currently in orbit aren't designed for robotic manipulation or augmentation.

The U.S. national space strategy's emphasis on deregulation (see 1803260003) hopefully means the administration won't allow regulatory agencies to deny private actors access to space on the basis of non-self-executing treaty provisions, space lawyer Laura Montgomery blogged Monday. Article VI of the Outer Space Treaty (OST), requiring government authorization and supervision of nongovernmental activities in space, doesn't say those activities must be authorized, she said. She also said Article VI isn't self-executing, meaning it doesn't create an obligation or prohibition on the private sector unless and until Congress says it does. The Obama administration interpreted Article VI to require authorization of all nongovernmental activities in space, and the FAA indicated it could use Article VI as a means to deny a private entity access to space. But that FAA position ignored the Supreme Court's position on non-self-executing treaties, and regulatory agencies shouldn't claim the power to use the article to deny such access to space since it "would only shackle the commercial space industry," Montgomery said. Meanwhile, conforming to OST doesn't mean limits on governments should apply to private entities, since the treaty doesn't say that, she said. For example, Article II's bar on national appropriation doesn't ban private appropriation, she said.

Iridium and Speedcast have signed a deal for Speedcast to add the Iridium Certus service to its Atlas portfolio of offerings targeting the land mobile market, such as real-time vehicle tracking, internet, phone and data transfer, Iridium said Tuesday. It said the two companies already partner on global maritime services. It said testing of the Certus service, provided via the Next constellation, is underway and it will be rolled out commercially via a series of service classes.