The six orders placed in the first half of 2023 for geostationary orbit communications satellites are on par with numbers for recent years, Quilty Space Director-Research Caleb Henry tweeted Friday. What's different is the growth in demand for small GEOs, with five of the six being under 500 kg, he said.

The FCC Wireless Bureau validated accelerated clearing of the lower C band by Telesat, Eutelsat and Embratel, per three bureau orders Friday. The validation triggers the relocation payment clearinghouse notifying the licensees of the 3.7-4 GHz band about the validation, with the licensees then having 60 days to pay their portion of the Phase II accelerated relocation payments to the clearinghouse, which will then divide the money among the satellite operators.

The U.S. government is increasingly, and worryingly, dependent on SpaceX for launch missions to the International Space Station, former NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said Thursday at a George Washington University/Aerospace Corp. space event. He said government purchases of launch services need to be spread among multiple providers, and those providers should have customers beyond the government, if the end goal is competition on cost and innovation, he said. He said NASA's Space Launch System wasn't designed by the agency but by politicians interested in money going to particular states and Congressional districts.

Noting cheaper launches and lower capital costs opening the door to more satellite operators offering IoT services, ABI Research said Wednesday satellite IoT connections are expected to jump from 10.4 million in 2022 to 27 million in 2030. It said satellite IoT connection revenue is likely to grow from $2.2 billion last year to $7.8 billion in 2030.

OneWeb expanded its connectivity services to regions above 35 degrees north, giving it more coverage of Europe and most of the U.S., it said Wednesday. It said the expansion also enhances its connectivity across Canada and in more maritime regions. OneWeb had been delivering wholesale connectivity at 50 degrees north. It anticipates offering global service by year's end.

Maker of satellites hosting programmable scientific labs Odyssey SpaceWorks seeks FCC authorization to launch and operate its OSW Cazorla non-geostationary orbit satellite. In a Space Bureau application Monday, Odyssey said the mission -- to go up on a SpaceX launch later this year -- would host a lab module looking at the growth of fruit fly protein cells in low earth orbit and a separate module testing Odyssey's data transmission capabilities.

SES anticipates completing its remaining C-band clearing work as early as next week and filing its Phase II accelerated relocation certification shortly thereafter, company representatives told aides to FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, per a docket 18-122 filing Tuesday. The company urged the agency to do what it can to support the relocation payment clearinghouse's prompt review of remaining reimbursement claims.

SpaceX arguments that Iceye's planned constellation should be subject to the same conditions as SpaceX's second-generation Starlink constellation lacks any explanation about why they should be applied, Iceye told the FCC Space Bureau Monday. It's one of multiple operators SpaceX argued should be subject to conditions similar to second-gen Starlinks (see 2301180049). It said the SpaceX conditions were specific to that company's plans for a 30,000-satellite constellation, while Iceye has authority to launch six satellites and is seeking authority for eight more. SpaceX doesn't assert the conditions on Iceye "are inadequate in any matter," Iceye said.

Future services available via Lockheed Martin's planned Parsec lunar communications network could include data storage, processing and power, company officials told FCC Space Bureau Chief Julie Kearney, per a bureau filing last week. Lockheed said it expects its initial commercial mission to the lunar surface to be in Q1 2026, same as launch of Parsec-1, one of its planned relay satellites between the moon and Earth. Lockheed said there's no need for a rulemaking before FCC action on its applications (see 2305040005), saying there's precedent to grant waivers to allow new technologies and services when there's no seeming risk to ongoing operations. IT said the 7/8 GHz band is already allocated for similar uses, and there's no proof there would be Earth interference from operations on the moon's surface. Arguing earlier this month for a rulemaking, CTIA said that approach "would proactively build policy guidelines that create regulatory certainty for the nascent lunar telecommunications industry as well as ensuring that the Commission can advance its terrestrial mobile broadband goals."

Discussions to combine with Intelsat "have ceased," SES said Thursday. SES acknowledged in March the two were talking (see 2303300037).