Gov Commit £30m to Help Develop UK LEO Satellite Broadband and Related Tech

The government has today committed a further £30m of public investment from the UK Space Agency’s 4-year £160m Connectivity in Low Earth Orbit (C-LEO) programme, which will be used to develop new satellite technologies and components to help supply “high-speed internet, communications and data services” around the world.

Regular readers might recall that the government has been quite busy in this area. For example, they originally committed £16m £18m to a first round of three projects under C-LEO at the start of 2025 (here) – these will continue for two more years, developing user terminals, active antennas and on-board regenerative processors.

Since then, the government has separately also invested £155m to develop alternative ways of delivering accurate Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) solutions to complement GPS (here) – supporting everything from mobile (4G/5G) signals to in-car Sat Nav – and have put £6.9m toward better satellite optical links and 5G NTN solutions (here).

The second found of £30m in C-LEO funding being released today similarly aims to back new projects to develop advanced technologies that are essential to the future of connectivity. “With the global market currently worth around £40 billion and growing at over 10% annually, driven by demand for services such as navigation and positioning, broadband internet, weather forecasting, and maritime and aviation tracking, there is a significant opportunity for UK companies to capture a greater share. These technologies are also vital for defence and national security,” said the announcement.

UK Space Minister, Liz Lloyd, said:

“Space is now the cornerstone of our modern economy. Satellite constellations have revolutionised how we operate, digitalising industries, optimising logistics and connecting all corners of the globe.

This new funding will support the development of smarter satellites with better hardware, the use of AI to make data delivery faster and improved connections between spacecraft.

This is part of the government’s commitment to keeping UK companies at the forefront of satellite communications, delivering economic growth and strengthening our defence and national security.”

The government hopes the new programme will support the next generation of advanced satellite capabilities, such as “enabling faster processing of information, lower latency and greater assurance for where UK data lands and is held“. Applications for the new funding are now open (here) and will remain accessible until 13th April 2026 – individual applications for UK Space Agency funding are expected to be a minimum of £3,000,000. The results of this funding round are then due to be finalised by Friday 8th May 2026.