Global satellite operator Telesat and French telecommunications multinational Orange officially inaugurated a flagship satellite gateway teleport in Bercenay-en-Othe, France, today. The state-of-the-art ground facility will serve as a primary European terrestrial interconnect for the Telesat Lightspeed low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation.

Equipped with multiple advanced tracking parabolic antennas and high-throughput optical feeder links, the gateway connects low-Earth orbit spacecraft directly to Orange's high-capacity trans-European terrestrial fiber optic backbone, ensuring secure, sovereign, and ultra-low-latency data transmission.

Sovereign Connectivity for Enterprise and Defense

The facility represents a key milestone in Europe's broader push for digital and communications sovereignty. By routing enterprise traffic through dedicated, encrypted European gateways, public sector organizations and critical infrastructure operators reduce dependency on consumer-oriented broadband mega-constellations.

Telesat Lightspeed Gateway Specifications
Technical Feature Operational Metric Deployment Architecture Primary Advantage
Tracking Antennas 14 Ka-band Tracking Dishes Automated sky tracking arrays Uninterrupted beam handover
Backbone Capacity 100 Gbps Redundant Fiber Dual Orange Terrestrial POIs Zero terrestrial data packet loss
Round-Trip Latency Sub-35 milliseconds LEO orbital altitude (1,000 km) True fiber-equivalent speeds
Coverage Zone Western & Central Europe, Med, Maghreb Multi-spot beam orchestration High-security strategic data links

Accelerating Global Commercial Deployment

Orange Business will market Lightspeed services directly to enterprise customers across aviation, maritime shipping, and remote industrial sites where terrestrial fiber deployment is technically or economically unfeasible.

“This partnership marries Orange's premier global fiber infrastructure with Telesat's transformative low-Earth orbit architecture, providing European enterprises with sovereign, resilient, and blazing-fast connectivity.”

Telesat confirmed that orbital constellation deployment remains on track, with commercial service activation scheduled for the third quarter of 2027.

Sources

Telesat Orange Satellite Lightspeed Space Telecommunications France