No 'Straightforward Path' to How Satellite Can Play Bigger 5G Role, Conference Told

"There's no secret sauce" for how the satellite industry could play a bigger role in 5G standards setting, aside from committing resources, said Balazs Bertenyi, 3rd Generation Partnership Project TSG Radio Access Network chairman. If satellite doesn't play a role, the risk is further marginalization, said Antonio Franchi, European Space Agency head-future programmes acquisition, at the Satellite 2019 show Monday. Some satellite interests said the industry likely will be end-to-end integrated with 5G standards. Inmarsat Global Principal System Engineer Ammar Khan said "it's not a straightforward task." He said terrestrial 5G is deploying in phases, focusing on broadband first, with IoT and machine to machine to follow, and a phased approach would make sense for satellite. "Five years ago, [such integration] was unimaginable," Bertenyi said, saying such integration is welcome news for the mobile industry since mobile use cases alone won't be enough to make 5G a success.The big changes coming to the satellite industry include software defined hardware that can be reprogrammed in orbit, even to the point of changing the satellite's mission, said Lisa Callahan, Lockheed Martin general manager-commercial civil space. Industry officials said that future will require increased cybersecurity. IBM Watson Cloud Chief Technology Officer-partner ecosystem and cognitive security Jeb Linton said satellites are a particular security challenge because a bad actor could disable one permanently, so there's a particular need for advanced security technology not commonly employed today such as secure enclaves and advanced cryptographic capabilities.