Satellite for Africa in 2025: A Review

The global satellite industry is growing, changing, developing and innovating.  It is setting the pace and creating possibilities for all in the African landscape. We review some of the highlights during 2025 and the possible impact in Africa.

Introduction

The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) report in Q1 2025 revealed that Africa has the world’s lowest rate of Internet usage, with just 38% of the population online in 2024, compared to a global average of 68%. Moreover, access is unevenly distributed — geography plays a major role. In urban areas, 57% of people were online in 2024, but in rural communities, only 23% had internet access. This urban–rural gap is among the widest globally, highlighting how many rural Africans remain cut off from digital services.

It is this demand in Africa, and in similar regions globally, that drives the innovation and developments within the satellite industry. With each new development, complexity is added to the industry landscape, often bringing both opportunity and risks for current ICT service and solution providers. We review the highlights during 2025 and the possible future impact.

From “Satellite Internet” to “Satellite Mobile Service”

2025 marks the shift of Starlink’s Direct-to-Device / Direct-2-Cell (D2C) from experimental or beta phase to a real-world service. This service, in partnership with mobile operators, aims to connect unmodified 4G phones directly to satellites for texting. SpaceX also invested $17B to obtain the dedicated mobile services spectrum from EchoStar, providing Starlink with more control over the complete value chain—and the potential to compete head-on with terrestrial mobile networks in underserved or remote regions.

Independent measurements (~4 Mbps) show that even if D2C doesn’t match fibre, it’s already good enough for many basic communications (messaging, light data, fallback Internet). And there is room for improvement.

Yes, we can appreciate that the measured ~4 Mbps speeds apply to sparsely populated or remote zones, and as more users come online (and satellites become congested), real-world speeds may fluctuate or degrade. Also, the “per beam” performance depends heavily on regulatory and spectrum factors.

Regulatory requirements, spectrum licensing, device compatibility, and industry standardisation are still open discussion points that must be solved in a complex environment, particularly in the African market with our strong regulatory frameworks and an industry dominated by the mobile network operators.

While the final outcome and roadmap are not yet defined, what is clear is that Starlink has stepped into the “mobile services provider” arena, which will bring a new set of advantages and complications to the African market.

1Tbps Anywhere Anytime

In November this year, ViaSat Inc. announced the successful launch of the ViaSat-3 Flight 2 (F2) satellite. Described as having “ultra-high-capacity” with dynamic beam-forming and frequency-agile payloads, the ViaSat-3 satellites (including F2) are marketed as able to shift and concentrate bandwidth to different geographic “hotspots” as demand changes. F2 was specifically designed to service Europe, the Middle East, and Africa using Ka Geostationary services.

To quantify this capacity, we can consider servicing entry-level broadband users with an average demand of 10Mbps. At this demand level ViaSat-3 F2 will be able to service 1 million broadband users in a 1:10 active-to-standby ratio. This is of course assuming the full 1Tbps capacity will be allocated to Africa, which is unlikely. A more realistic expectation is around 500,000 users in Africa.

Yes, this is a Geostationary service that is expected to provide 500Mbps / 50Mbps data speeds at a latency of 700msec. While the latency is always quoted as a fundamental disadvantage, it is also true that lower equipment costs, service rates, and better service quality, as well as market compliance, are bigger influencing parameters than only latency. ViaSat-3 F2 is well-positioned to service business broadband, enterprise, and governments that require assured broadband services with high service availability and predictable quality-of-service levels.

+3300 Satellites – USA, Europe and China

2025 marked the year that the LEO broadband industry shifted forever from a “single provider” domain to a “multiple providers and multiple geo-political regions” domain. While the number of satellite launches are still dominated by Starlink, the significance and future impact has certainly shifted.

Project Kuiper is now officially Amazon LEO and has an expected 150 satellites launched by the end of this year. This also signals the strategy swift within Amazon from developing LEO services under a project brand to now fully adopting the Amazon LEO brand for the emerging service.  It is expected that Amazon LEO will be active in Africa mid-2026, with full operational service in 2027.

We should also note that for LEO constellations, quantity is not necessarily quality. In particular, the Amazon LEO constellation is based on larger, more capable satellites with higher per-sat throughput that are heavily optimised for beam-forming flexibility, user segmentation, and integration with AWS edge infrastructure. Supporting a strategy that fewer satellites are required to achieve similar user densities in targeted markets. Amazon pursues a “less in numbers but more capable satellites” model which is easier to integrate with cloud infrastructure and have better economics on launch (each launched satellite carries more capacity).

For the African market, this means a satellite connectivity solution heavily aligned to unlock connectivity as much as cloud computing.

China’s Spacesail Qianfan / Thousand Sails stepped up launches in 2025 with the 1^st tests in Q1, and an expected 648 satellites by end-2025 with the total constellation planned for 14,000 to 15,000 satellites.

The Spacesail constellation has now positioned China as another LEO constellation provider, and more specifically, has provided Africa with an alternative option when viewed within a geo-political alliance perspective.

Eutelsat OneWeb received full support from the European Union this year, as part of the SpaceRise consortium and IRIS² LEO constellation programme. Driven by a strong European agenda for sovereignty and independence, the planned OneWeb gen-2 constellations will now have much wider European support and funding.

For Africa this means that the future market will be serviced by at least 4 global LEO broadband constellations, out of different political domains, and with very different medium and long-term strategies.

Conclusion

Within the broadband satellite industry, 2025 was the year that changed everything, and yet nothing is different – at least not yet. It is the year that marked the beginning of a new global constellation fabric that will set future business engagements and impact telecommunications in Africa forever.

For Africa this is an exciting and very promising time with multiple global LEO and GEO operators investing and building the global networks to service Africa. It also underwrites the need for African-based service providers such as Q-KON and their Smart Satellite Service Twoobii, that have expertise and experience to leverage the global networks and deliver African user-centric services to the local markets.