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The telecom industry is undergoing its greatest period of disruption since the telegraph, as companies work to open up space as the next frontier for communications. French startup Constellation hopes to take part by repurposing 5G tech to provide a Starlink-like satellite broadband that uses telecoms’ existing assets.
Constellation Technologies and Operations, to call it by its full name, plans to launch a constellation of satellites in very low Earth orbit and work directly with telecom operators to provide high-speed internet access via small (but stationary) user terminals.
The company would do this by repurposing terrestrial 5G spectrum for space-based connectivity — cellular signals can actually reach to and from orbit if handled right. Constellation would provide the capacity and terminals but the customer would pay the telecom company for the service, with that subscription revenue shared.
Constellation founder and CEO Charles Delfieux acknowledged in a recent interview that the space sector is at a turning point: “For the first time in the history of space and telecommunication, we are basically witnessing a convergence between space and terrestrial connectivity in terms of performance and price,” he said. “That convergence is basically making those sought-after, cost-effective solutions to deliver connectivity as something that is completely achievable.”
An engineer by training, Delfieux spent the majority of his career working at the World Bank, where he acted as program manager leading the structuring and financing of large infrastructure projects in emerging countries. He witnessed firsthand how access to reliable internet remains a challenge for millions of people. With the support of a first investor, he resigned from the World Bank and founded Constellation in 2022.
“If you want to really achieve ubiquitous, universal connectivity, the only way to do that is to leverage space technologies,” he said.
He acknowledged that the most successful example to-date is Starlink, whose performance and price is getting closer and closer to what terrestrial solutions provide. But Delfieux said that the Constellation team eventually realized that the most promising business plan is to essentially work with, not against, terrestrial telecom operators. By doing so, he sees massive opportunity to provide universal internet access regardless of location or existing connectivity.
The plan is bolstered by some technological innovations, namely the development of a satellite form factor that will be capable of operating in very low Earth orbit, around 375 kilometers, which Delfieux says will help boost the performance of the system. Constellation also aims to repurpose part of the 5G spectrum allocated to the telecom operators on the ground for its space communications service.
By doing so, Delfieux said the startup will help telecoms to monetize the full extent of their 5G networks – and more meaningfully compete with new entrants like SpaceX and Amazon’s Kuiper.
“Established national, regional, traditional telecom operators, they are seeing these very powerful, very influential players, new entrants in telecommunications sector, that start operating a broadband constellation, that start delivering broadband services from space…they are more and more aiming at taking their own space within the telecommunication sector, in direct competition with established national and regional telecom operators. So it’s a threat. We basically want to be the ones providing a telco-friendly solution for the telecom operator. So tomorrow they can compete with those new entrants.”
By using 5G spectrum, Constellation can also integrate within the design of its user terminals and satellite payloads mass produced, cheap components that are already being produced for terrestrial communication networks in order to drive down costs, he added.
The company has secured a €9.3 million ($10.2 million) seed round to accelerate its plans. The new funding comes from the Expansion Fund, Bpifrance and a previous unnamed investor.
Constellation estimates that its business model will need a constellation of 1,500 satellites to provide global coverage – an ambitious number by any measure – with performance rates of 150 Mbps downlink and 50 Mbps uplink and a latency of less than 30 milliseconds.
The company plans first on launching a hosted payload to orbit by June 2025 to carry out an end-to-end test of the service. From there, it will launch two prototype satellites by the end of 2026 with the aim of deploying production satellites the following year.
