SES and Intelsat tie the knot at last

There was a sense of closure in the satellite industry when Luxembourg’s SES finally agreed a €2.8 billion ($3.1 billion) deal to acquire US-based Intelsat, as the sector recalibrates to a new era, one heavily influenced by the LEO (low earth orbit) sector. The SES acquisition follows two other major consolidative moves among the major legacy satellite platform providers over the last two years, with ViaSat finalizing its $7.3 billion takeover of the UK’s Inmarsat almost a year ago. Then in September 2023, France’s Eutelsat completed its $3.4 billion all-share acquisition of the UK’s OneWeb, with the combined group retaining its headquarters in Paris. This left OneWeb as a Eutelsat subsidiary operating commercially as Eutelsat One Web with its operations…