French-U.K. Starlink rival pitches Canada on ‘sovereign’ satellite service for Arctic military operations
Joint project with Eutelsat promoted by French president during G7 summit
A company largely owned by the French and U.K. governments is pitching Canada on a roughly $250-million plan to provide the military with secure satellite broadband coverage in the Arctic, CBC News has learned.
Eutelsat, a rival to tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Starlink, already provides some services to the Canadian military, but wants to deepen the partnership as Canada looks to diversify defence contracts away from suppliers in the United States.
A proposal for Canada’s Department of National Defence to join a French Ministry of Defence initiative involving Eutelsat was apparently raised by French President Emmanuel Macron with Prime Minister Mark Carney on the sidelines of last year’s G7 summit in Alberta.
The prime minister’s first question, according to Eutelsat and French defence officials, was how the proposal would affect the Telesat Corporation, a former Canadian Crown corporation that was privatized in the 1990s.
Telesat is in the process of developing its Lightspeed system, a Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellation of satellites for high-speed broadband.
And in mid-December, the Liberal government announced it had established a strategic partnership with Telesat and MDA Space to develop the Canadian Armed Forces’ military satellite communications (MILSATCOM) capabilities.
‘Sovereign capacity’
A Eutelsat official said the company already has its own satellite network in place and running, along with Canadian partners, and has been providing support to the Canadian military deployed in Latvia.
“What we can provide for Canada is what we call a sovereign capacity capability where Canada would actually own all of our capacity in the Far North or wherever they require it,” said David van Dyke, the general manager for Canada at Eutelsat, in a recent interview with CBC News.
“We also give them the ability to not be under the control of a singular individual who could decide to disconnect the service for political or other reasons.”
What van Dyke is referencing, more than anything else, are reports that Musk ordered Starlink switched off in Ukraine during a pivotal push by the Eastern European country to retake territory from Russia in late September 2022.
The order disrupted the counteroffensive in areas including Kherson, a strategic region north of the Black Sea. At least 100 terminals went dark, according to sources who spoke to the Reuters News Agency.
Souring on Starlink?
Starlink has hundreds of thousands of customers in Canada and has been a major source of broadband internet access in the Far North. Starlink is a subsidiary of Musk’s SpaceX rocket company.
But Musk’s time as head of the Department of Government Efficiency in U.S. President Donald Trump’s second administration has dampened enthusiasm to the point where Ontario — angered by U.S. tariffs — last summer officially cancelled a $100-million contract with Starlink to provide service in northern communities.
Eutelsat has had significant contracts with the U.S. government, including the Pentagon. But since Trump returned to office the company has seen at least one large U.S. Department of Defence contract — worth $55 million US — not renewed.
The company’s chief financial officer, Christophe Caudrelier, told investors last spring that the non-renewal “reflects the change in the new presidential administration’s geographic prioritization for the Defense Department, with the additional context of efforts to cut government spending overall.”
Eutelsat provided secure communications in the aviation field, connecting to both manned aircraft and drones, as well as airborne intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft, according to the company’s website.
The French government is the largest shareholder in the company. Indian multinational Bharti Space Ltd. and the U.K. government are also major shareholders.
A big part of Eutelsat’s pitch to Canada involves the now-familiar language of finding a reliable defence partner and having control over the secure systems and data.
“We’re giving them the opportunity to have control and to partner with the trusted nations and also provided all the things they require to support things like over the horizon radar sites, NORAD modernization projects and the expansion into the North for defence,” said van Dyke.
“We can do that today. So it’s just requiring the ability for the Canadian government to say yes to taking that [satellite] capacity from us and then distributing it.”
Related stories from around the North:
Canada: Canada launches partnerships to close Arctic military communications gap, Eye on the Arctic
Greenland: As Greenland rejects Starlink, China and Russia tighten military ties, Blog by Mia Bennett
Norway: New satellites to boost communications in Arctic Norway, The Independent Barents Observer
Russia: Russian military to get fast, secure internet through trans-Arctic cable, The Independent Barents Observer
United States: $30.3 million grant announced to build up high-speed internet in rural Alaska, Eye on the Arctic
