Telstra Expands Presence With First of Three Dedicated Teleports in Australia for OneWeb

Each will provide ground-station support for fleet of low-earth–orbit satellites.

Telstra is expanding its presence in the rapidly growing satellite-telecommunications market, building and maintaining three new dedicated teleports across Australia to provide satellite-gateway services for OneWeb in the Southern Hemisphere.  The first of the new teleports, located in Darwin Tivendale, is scheduled to begin installation this month with go-live planned in July. Two further sites — Charlton Toowoomba and Wangara, Perth, Western Australia — are planned for completion later this year. Each facility will provide turnkey ground-station support for OneWeb’s growing fleet of low-earth–orbit (LEO) satellites.

These facilities are being delivered as part of a 10-year deal between Telstra and OneWeb. Telstra’s turnkey approach for OneWeb includes designing, building, and activating the teleports with ground-station capabilities to meet OneWeb’s requirements. Telstra will also provide 24/7 monitoring and quality-assurance services at each location.

Telstra Americas’ Vish Vishwanathan: “We worked in close partnership with [OneWeb] from site selection through construction.”

“OneWeb had exacting requirements from the outset, and we worked in close partnership with them from site selection through construction,” says Vish Vishwanathan, VP, wholesale and satellite, Telstra Americas. “Teleports are complex sites involving access to secure and resilient infrastructure and on-the-ground expertise, which Telstra has provided to OneWeb throughout this project.”

Telco providers typically own and operate significant terrestrial and subsea assets, including fiber networks, IP backbones, and data centers. These resources provide the critical ground service required to support satellite operators’ growing constellations, reduce their costs of entry into new markets, and minimize the need for personnel to maintain their own terrestrial infrastructures.

Telstra has built a new teleport in Darwin, Australia, to serve OneWeb in the Southern Hemisphere.

“Low-earth-orbit–satellite technology is transforming the global connectivity landscape, not only by creating new business opportunities but also by giving more businesses, communities, and governments the internet access they need for progress,” says Michele Franci, chief of delivery and operations, OneWeb. “More connectivity options benefit everyone, and our approach in establishing strategic partnerships with experienced providers like Telstra is core to how we deliver the OneWeb mission.”

OneWeb has two-thirds of its constellation launched and is providing coverage above the 50th parallel north, reaching areas that have historically been hard to connect with distributed communities and challenging terrain. This includes Alaska, Canada, and the wider Arctic Region.

This month, OneWeb signed an MOU with Telstra to explore new connectivity solutions for Australia and the Asia-Pacific regions.