UK ISP Cerberus Networks has given ISPreview an unexpected surprise this afternoon after they began informing their customers about their decision to introduce “high-speed satellite internet services“, which will aim to deliver broadband speeds of “up to 150Mbps” and should complement their existing range of fixed line plans.
According to the notice, seen by ISPreview, the new service will harness Eutelsat’s recently launched Konnect VHTS (Very High Throughput) broadband satellite, which went live back in October 2023 (here) and is currently in a high Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO) of around 35,000km. The VHTS weighs 6.3 tonnes, supports 230 beams over Western Europe and has a large Ka-band (radio spectrum) capacity of around 500Gbps (Gigabits per second).
However, the same announcement refers to their service as also offering a “Low Earth Orbit Business Broadband” service, before saying that both their “LEO and GEO satellite packages offer speeds of up to 200Mbps with various data usage options to suit your needs.”
In other words, Cerberus Networks have launched a set of both GEO and LEO powered satellite broadband packages, although it’s not completely clear what satellites they’re harnessing for the LEO service. But we assume it’s OneWeb, as Eutelsat is the only company named.
Extract for Cerberus Network’s Customer Letter
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The customer email includes a link to a promotional document, which right at the bottom also adds some details on their business-focused satellite broadband packages and prices – both the GEO and LEO solutions. Naturally, as OneWeb’s LEO solution isn’t normally aimed at the domestic market, then that particular solution is a bit more expensive.
The GEO packages typically start at £40 +vat per month for their entry-level 30Mbps (5Mbps upload) package with 20GB (GigaBytes) of priority data, after which the service speeds will typically be throttled. But take note that their GEO packages will only be able to offer slow latency times of around 600-700ms (milliseconds) and there’s no mention of that the LEO service can deliver, but it’ll probably be below the 100ms mark.