SES has announced plans to deploy meoSphere, a next-generation medium Earth orbit satellite network targeted to enter service by 2030, as the company moves to significantly expand the capacity and capabilities of its MEO infrastructure. The initiative begins with a strategic collaboration focused on efficient satellite production and tighter supply-chain oversight.
Under the first phase of the programme, SES will integrate its in-house developed software-defined payloads, manufactured in Luxembourg, with an initial fleet of 28 high-power satellite platforms built by K2 Space. The partnership is designed to streamline manufacturing timelines, enhance cost control, and give SES greater visibility over critical supply-chain components, creating a scalable foundation for future network expansion.
meoSphere is designed as SES’s next-generation MEO system to dramatically increase global broadband capacity while enabling faster user data speeds and reducing terminal size and cost. The improvements are driven by advancements in satellite payload and terminal technologies, software-defined networking, and 5G non-terrestrial network standards, combined with the inherent advantages of medium Earth orbit. These include efficient regional coverage, the ability to redirect capacity to high-demand zones, optimised ground-station deployment, and low-latency performance. The network will support growing connectivity needs across government, mobility, and fixed telecommunications sectors and is designed to be compatible with IRIS2.
Orbiting approximately 8,000 km above Earth, meoSphere is being engineered to adapt to emerging missions and customer requirements. Beyond its core broadband services, the network will support multi-mission operations, including integration with sovereign satellite systems for government users that require independent and secure infrastructure. SES also plans for meoSphere to serve the expanding space economy by hosting third-party payloads and operating as a backbone network in space, enabling real-time data relay between satellite constellations in various orbits and ground networks.
Adel Al-Saleh, CEO of SES, said: “Space is the invisible backbone of the global data economy and national security. Together with K2 Space and other space partners, we’re building meoSphere as essential infrastructure—constructed faster, designed to handle massive data demands globally, and built to support the secure, resilient sovereign networks that our global government allies depend on.”
Karan Kunjur, Co-Founder and CEO of K2 Space, added: “The meoSphere partnership with SES is a clear validation of K2’s mission to build the highest power satellites on orbit to realize our partners’ and customers’ ambitions in space. We’re incredibly proud to partner in this effort with SES, a longstanding and forward-leaning space industry leader who shares our commitment to building new, efficient space architectures at speed and scale.”
SES plans to conduct a series of medium Earth orbit pathfinder missions with K2 Space over the next three years to test satellite platforms and payload technologies in orbit. These missions will gradually incorporate more complex payload systems, allowing SES to refine operational strategies and reduce deployment risks before full-scale implementation.
The meoSphere announcement expands on an existing collaboration between SES and K2 Space and aligns with SES’s previously announced capital expenditure plans for the 2026 financial year. The company said the initiative will follow its disciplined capital deployment policy and rely on a balanced mix of commercial and public-private partnerships to manage financial exposure. SES also intends to maintain a transatlantic dual supply chain to strengthen resilience against potential component shortages, regulatory delays, and logistical constraints.
The network is designed for customers whose operations require highly reliable connectivity. For government and defense users, meoSphere will provide secure command-and-control communications capable of operating in contested environments. The orbital configuration of MEO satellites offers enhanced resilience compared to dense low Earth orbit constellations, while the system’s transparent payload architecture allows sovereign operators to run independent waveforms and modems, including within military Ka-band spectrum ranges. Optical inter-satellite links will enable secure routing of data to designated ground gateways.
Mobility customers in aviation and maritime sectors will benefit from high-throughput connectivity comparable to fiber networks, supporting passenger services, crew communications, and operational systems across global routes, including remote oceanic regions. The combination of high bandwidth and low latency is designed to support large-scale commercial aviation deployments. SES also plans to provide multi-orbit mobility services that combine MEO capabilities with existing low Earth and geostationary satellite assets.
Telecommunications operators and enterprise clients will gain access to a high-performance connectivity layer built on 5G non-terrestrial network standards, enabling path diversity and expanded network coverage.
As a multi-mission space network, meoSphere is engineered to meet stringent requirements for security, reliability, operational control, and resilience across both public and private sector applications. Its architecture combines K2 Space’s high-power satellite bus systems, which manage propulsion, power, and flight operations, with SES’s digital regenerative payloads that host mission-critical communication equipment. By developing payloads and software internally, SES aims to accelerate manufacturing cycles, standardize testing procedures, and maintain direct oversight of system performance.
The network’s modular architecture will also enable SES to scale beyond the initial 28 satellites based on market demand, ensuring long-term flexibility as global connectivity requirements continue to grow.
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