The cruise ship market's demand for bandwidth points to "the bandwidth battles ... only beginning," Northern Sky Research analyst Brad Grady blogged Wednesday. He noted 570 Gbps of capacity growth is expected by 2027.

The blackout of Univision content on Dish Network and its Sling over-the-top product (see 1807030044) entered its second month Monday. Both sides indicated they are far apart on a new deal, as the direct broadcast satellite provider began offering some customers credits. Univision representatives "returned to their corporate offices last week at which time we offered several paths forward to show Dish how serious we are about resolving this dispute amicably," a spokesman for the broadcaster emailed us. "Dish responded with an offer that was essentially the same as the one they previously offered back in June. We remain open and willing to negotiate with Dish at any time and ready to return to their offices this week should they choose to be constructive." With "renewal talks in an apparent deadlock," Dish will issue $5 monthly credits for August customer bills to DishLatino and Sling Latino package subscribers, the DBS provider said earlier Monday. "We assume Univision's decision is permanent: Univision executives are seeking a massive rate increase despite reports showing the programmer lost more than 50 percent of its prime-time viewership in the last seven years," said Dish CEO Erik Carlson. "While we've been available, responsive and have made a best effort to negotiate, Univision appears to be forcing an impasse." The FCC still isn't commenting on the dispute.

Beam Communications received an order for 5,000 units of the Iridium Go portable satellite hot spot, it said Friday, bringing the total order number since 2014 to 35,000. Delivery will be second half 2019. Michael Capocchi, Beam Communications CEO, said the order reflects increasing end-user demand for a device providing a global voice, messaging and SOS emergency activation in one unit. Apps for Microsoft Exchange, Gmail and weather have added functionality, it said. An Iridium Go hot spot was selling on www.satellitephonestore.com Friday for $795, with airtime plans starting at $59 monthly for 40 minutes on a one-year contract.

Satellite startup Swarm, subject of an FCC Enforcement Bureau investigation of a previous unauthorized satellite launch (see 1805030034), is asking for agency approval to downlink orbital data from those satellites. In an Office of Engineering and Technology application earlier this month, Swarm said it wants a 180-day special temporary authority for downlinking the data, which then would be made available to other satellite operators and to federal agencies to ensure interested parties have current orbital parameters for four SpaceBee satellites. It said the four are in orbit at roughly 500 kilometers altitude. The company didn't comment Wednesday; the FCC said the investigation is ongoing. Swarm also has a pending experimental license application for launch of more cubesats (see 1806110004).

The blackout of Univision content on Dish Network and its Sling over-the-top product continued (see 1807020030) Tuesday, both sides confirmed. And access by the MVPD’s subscribers to the broadcaster’s programming over the air became another point of contention. Dish is continuing to give some subscribers free antennas so they can watch the broadcasts terrestrially, a spokeswoman told us. Qualifying for one “depends on where a customer is located and the signal strength available in that” market, she emailed. “The ball remains in Univision’s court. Univision walked away from the negotiation table June 29 and has not countered DISH’s latest proposal.” The broadcaster’s Galavision and Univision Deportes Network are only on pay TV, noted a Univision spokesman. “Plus, getting TV over the air simply isn’t an ideal option for a significant number of Americans,” he emailed. “DISH’s attempts to devalue Univision by pointing to over the air option as an across-the-board solution is either uninformed or disingenuous. DISH customers who value Univision’s programming have already subscribed to their bundled service and expect it.”

Univision is warning its viewers on Dish Network of a possible forthcoming blackout. In a statement Friday, it said Dish has "dismissed multiple good-faith carriage offers," including one that would extend the current agreement temporarily to avoid a blackout. Dish "still seems intent on entering what would be their 68th broadcast blackout since 2010," it said. Univision said it's notifying viewers through social media, its radio stations in applicable markets and its apps. Dish said Univision is asking for a rate increase of 75 percent for channels that have had ratings declines of close to 33 percent over the past five years, and Univision lost rights to the World Cup for 2018, 2022 and 2026. The MVPD said it's "unsure why Univision decided to involve customers in the contract negotiation process" since there's still time to reach a deal. Neither company said when the current carriage deal expires.

The satellite industry globally had revenue of $268.6 billion last year, its third straight year of low-single-digit percentage growth, and the U.S. share at $113 billion marked a third year of similar growth, the Satellite Industry Association's reported Wednesday. Bryce Space and Technology prepared the report. SIA said of the 1,738 satellites in orbit as of year's end, commercial communications accounted for 31 percent and earth observation another 29 percent, by far the biggest categories. It said 345 commercially procured satellites were launched last year, more than double the 126 in 2016, with cubesat traffic driving most of that. Bryce Senior Program Manager Anton Dolgopolov said cubesat traffic likely would be similar this year, as long as launch availability doesn't get constricted. The eight total geostationary orbit satellite orders of 2017 are "a disproportionately low year" and could be an anomaly since there have been eight orders so far in 2018, said Bryce CEO Carissa Christensen. Roughly half of those 345 were earth observation satellites, SIA said. Christensen said venture capital funding of smallsats gravitated toward earth observation first, and now those constellations are starting to be deployed while communications smallsats are in the planning and development stages. 2017 was the second year of double-digit revenue growth for earth observation, and the completion of some constellations should mean an even higher growth rate this year, SIA President Tom Stroup said. Satellite broadband revenue rose 4 percent and subscribers gained 5 percent to roughly 2 million, SIA said. Stroup said the industry has been constricted on capacity, but recent launches of high-throughput satellites by ViaSat and EchoStar should allow bigger satellite broadband subscriber growth this year. U.S. operators had notable revenue drops in DBS and growth in managed services, SIA said. It said the average price per kilogram for launch dropped 40 percent from 2016, due to cheaper SpaceX launches and fewer expensive United Launch Alliance Delta IV rocket launches than in 2016. The Russian launch industry continues to lose market share as reliability concerns scare off potential customers, along with a deliberate pull back on commercial activity and a focus more on supporting the Russian national space program, said Dolgopolov. SIA said launch industry revenue fell 16 percent to $4.6 billion, and the U.S. had the largest share of commercially procured launch revenue at 39 percent.

Eutelsat’s TV service-provider customers in Russia, Europe and the Americas booked 5,500 hours of HD broadcast capacity for the World Cup, which opens Friday for a monthlong run, said the satellite operator Tuesday.

Iridium and Gogo agreed to make Gogo a manufacturer of Iridium Certus aviation terminals and a provider of the L-band in-flight connectivity service, Iridium said Tuesday. It said Gogo has been an Iridium reseller since 2002. It said initial flight trials for Certus aviation applications will be later this year, with commercial service targeting aviation users to start in mid-2019.

Orbit raising and payload testing for Telesat's phase one low earth orbit (LEO) satellite is done, and it's ready to demonstrate broadband capabilities, Orbit said Tuesday. It said Global Eagle Entertainment, OmniAccess, Optus Satellite and others will take part in live trials. It's evaluating options to expand its LEO constellation beyond current plans for 120 satellites providing global coverage.