UK satellite operator Avanti Communications, which has yet to even launch its new HYLAS broadband satellite (related news - HERE and HERE), has been awarded a project by the European Space Agency (ESA) contributing €250,000 in 2009 to the cost of work on a Preliminary Design Review for a new satellite system called Hercules.

This system has been proposed to the UK government's Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) as part of Avanti's response to the Digital Britain consultation, which is seeking to make a universal minimum UK broadband speed (USO) of 2Mbps a reality.


As per the past news items linked at the top of this article, ISPreview has raised more than a few concerns about the use of satellite services as a USO solution. High hardware/installation costs, uselessly restrictive usage allowances, unreliable speeds and poor latency are chief among those.

To date we've yet to see a satellite broadband service that could negate most of these fears, although some of the above claims (50Mbps) lead us towards a degree of cautious optimism. We have also just completed an interview with Avanti where some very difficult questions were put to them; expect that to surface at the start of June.