Broadband Satellite ISP Avanti (Avanti Communications), which successfully launched its first ever 10Mbps capable HYLAS 1 (Highly Adaptable Satellite) rural broadband spacecraft at the end of last year (here), has formally completed in orbit testing of the new satellite and expects to connect its first live UK customer next week.

The testing was completed yesterday and confirmed that Avanti's new Satellite was working in conformance with specification and, in some areas, delivering higher performance than originally specified.

The HYLAS 1 lifetime is expected to be at least six months greater than planned and the available power is several percentage points better than the initial specification called for. Avanti hopes that this will translate into improved service quality, flexibility and usable capacity.


It's understood that Avanti has a test customer base of 5,000 end-users whose service is delivered with leased Ku band capacity. The migration of these customers to HYLAS 1 will begin on April 4th 2011. It's not known how long this process will take, although we know of a few whom will be very happy to access the new service and leave behind their underperforming old one.

The operator also has over 60 Virtual Network Operator (VNO) customers in 16 countries in Europe who have bought capacity. Many of them are also migrating existing end user customers from leased Ku band capacity on other satellites and this migration also begins on April 4th.

Avanti has previously hinted that the pricing for its new service will start at around £25 per month for a 2Mbps connection, which seems quite steep in comparison to existing ASTRA and Eutelsat based ISPs. However, we do not yet know the final package line-up.

Meanwhile, Avanti's second satellite, called HYLAS 2, remains on target for launch in Q2 2012. It will extend Avanti’s coverage to Africa and the Middle East and add a degree of redundancy into their network.

Eutelsat is also in the final testing stages of its competing KA-SAT spacecraft, which will offer similar broadband internet speeds of up to 10Mbps download (4Mbps uploads) and become part of their existing TooWay consumer rural broadband service in Europe and the UK a month or so after Avanti's service goes live next week.