The government is looking to launch its own satellite in the next five to seven years as part of multibillion-rand plan to plug connectivity holes in the country, increasing access to the internet for remote communities and reducing reliance on foreign communication services.
Satellites, a technology that has enabled the quick and immediate broadcast of services such as television and telecommunications from one part of the world to another in the past half century, are growing in strategic importance.
An area dominated by the US, Europe and increasingly China is now top of mind for policymakers looking to bolster connectivity for their populations.
On Tuesday, SA’s department of communications & digital technologies presented progress on the national satellite communication strategy (Satcom) in a joint sitting of parliament’s portfolio committees on communications and digital technologies, as well as science and innovation .
“When we embarked on this process it was really around [ensuring] how do we, as a country expand access to connectivity in all areas of the country including the most rural parts,” Khusela Diko, chair of the portfolio committee on communication and digital technologies, said.
“The second issue was around ensuring that there is greater self-determination, for lack of a better word, by SA in terms of our space programme.
At the initial meeting for a state digital infrastructure company, Diko’s committee had been made aware that “all of the satellite services that the country uses, whether it’s for broadcast or any other purpose,” are not locally owned.
As such, the state is working on a plan to build, deploy and maintain its own satellite infrastructure.
Estimates on how much it takes to build and send a satellite into space vary.
While the individual satellite costs have come down, creating a network in the sky is expensive. Launching a traditional high-altitude satellite is estimated to cost about $500m (about R9bn). To launch a network of low-altitude satellites, such as Starlink or OneWeb, costs about $5bn.
The Satcom strategy is being submitted to cabinet for approval to publish for public consultation. Once approved, the strategy will be gazetted, with the public and all stakeholders invited to make written submissions regarding the proposed strategy.
Parliament hopes to get regular updates each quarter as the project progresses.
Tebogo Leshope, acting CEO at Sentech, said: “Satellite technology is gaining traction in Africa and as a result [it] will become one of the future reliable capability to provide connectivity and services.
“One good example: about two weeks ago, our neighbouring country Botswana announced launching their own satellite Botsat-1. The size of the economy that Botswana is, the size of economy that SA is, the number of jobs that we have to protect ... leapfrogging to [the] next technology is becoming even more urgent.”
He emphasised “the need for us to move. We have made significant progress in the past three months with regards to coming closer to cabinet for approval”.
In recent years low earth orbit (LEO) satellites have grown in favour as a way to plug these gaps, with Starlink being the best-known such service. The main reason for the growth in LEO satellite use is the cost. Transporting equipment into space is now much cheaper than it was decades ago, in part because space rockets are now reusable — as demonstrated by SpaceX.
In terms of connectivity, the two disadvantages with traditional satellite technology have to do with latency (the time it takes for signals to reach their destination) and limited bandwidth (the amount of data that can travel through a signal). Fibre and mobile are therefore seen as superior forms of access.
Low-altitude satellites improve on this, offering faster speeds, mainly because they are closer to the ground. By launching many such satellites into the sky, creating a constellation, operators have been able to cover the main challenges associated with the technology. Thanks to these advances, operators predict that some functions of ground base stations and cellphone towers will be taken into the sky.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.