Rome, Italy – February 10, 2021 – iKO Media Group, a global end-to-end service provider for broadcasters has been carefully examining options for transitioning many of its customers’ services to new satellites and frequencies as a result of the upcoming use of C-band spectrum for 5G mobile services in the US. iKOMG has been actively looking for the best and most cost-effective satellite for contribution over the US and after extensive examination of the different solutions available, chose Intelsat’s Galaxy 18 as the most effective.
iKOMG has been a key player in facilitating the transition to the G18 satellite ultimately resulting in better performance and more power for broadcasting content for its customers. Currently, iKOMG is successfully transitioning customers over to the new satellite, working in coordination with Intelsat.
This transition is a complex and challenging undertaking — one that Intelsat has been preparing for with more than two years of planning and engineering undertaken in conjunction with Intelsat’s customers, industry stakeholders, vendors, and other space station operators. While there are a number of component parts to Intelsat’s Transition Plan, they have been carefully coordinated and are highly interdependent making the collaboration with iKO Media Group a major factor in their success.
Galaxy 18 has over 98% cable subscriber reach, tier 1 programming for sports and entertainment, higher power coverage over the US, with a strong focus on the East and West coast as well as full cable headend penetration.
We are very excited to partner with Intelsat to bring new and better capabilities for broadcasters over the US on a powerful satellite like the Galaxy 18. After extensive discussions with customers and potential customers, they are excited about this transition as well, as they can see the huge benefits to their channels and audiences.
saidMark Demichovski, VP Sales Operation, iKO Media Group
The G18 is very powerful over the continental US, providing great coverage and high EIRP, keeping us far from the 5G frequencies and well penetrated in the local market due to the Satellite provider efforts. We have been collaborating with Intelsat and this collaboration has proven to be seamless and successful.
Said Yaniv Maman, CTO, iKO Media Group
About the C-band
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has carefully developed a plan to clear 280 MHz of C-band spectrum (plus a 20-MHz guard band) for 5G mobile services in the contiguous United States (CONUS) as early as December 2023, with a portion of that spectrum becoming available as early as December 2021. With more advanced methods of digital encoding than they had in the 1970s, satellite companies can now “repack” their broadcasts into the upper portion of the C-Band, leaving the lower portion available for cellular companies to use.
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