Picture a school playground, with plucky new kids ribbing and taking potshots at the old guard. Or writer PJ O’Rourke’s line about how, “Age and guile beat youth, innocence and a bad haircut”.

Either works as analogy for Viasat’s role in the business aviation connectivity sphere.

With new entrants to the market threatening the status quo, the established global satcom provider is staying ahead through investment in next-generation technology, strategic acquisitions and smart partnerships.

Its 2023 acquisition of satellite provider Inmarsat gave it access to the Global Xpress network of GEO Ka-band satellites offering near-global coverage.

This complemented the company’s own GEO Ka-band network, primarily focused over North America. It plans to add to these with further satellite launches over the medium term, including three more Ka-band GEO satellites (GX7, GX8 and GX9) and four L-band GEO units.

The launch of its first ViaSat-3 next-generation GEO satellite over Europe, the Middle East and Africa in 2023 opened up a world of next-generation, high-throughput (1Tbps), dynamic bandwidth connectivity. The second and third units (F2 and F3) will enter service shortly, covering the Americas and Asia, bolstering coverage and adding extra capacity. While Starlink is struggling for regulatory approval in nations such as China and India, Viasat’s GEO network is able to offer “consistent, reliable, flexible” connectivity, says Claudio D’Amico, vice president of strategic market engagement, Business Aviation at Viasat.

And to fend off the growing threat from the new LEO operators who champion the low-latency benefits of their networks for applications such as streaming and video calls, Viasat is partnering with Telesat to access its Lightspeed LEO constellation. The service is expected to become operational in 2028.

“There is a possibility from thousands of customers on our network today,” adds D’Amico. “If you’re looking at gaming, if you want to do a high-definition video call, there’s a little bit of a latency impact if you don’t have that LEO component. So it’s a way to close the gap and stay ahead of that specific customer requirement.”

This “age and guile” has enabled Viasat to stay at the forefront of the business aviation connectivity sector, accounting for about 70% of the market and more than 5,000 business jets.

Working with distribution partners Gogo, Honeywell and Collins Aerospace, Viasat’s JetXP platform unifies the company’s legacy Jet ConneX and Viasat Ka services under a single, forward-looking brand. JetXP provides uncapped speeds, increased network prioritisation and expanded capacity. Viasat’s vision is to deliver a superior, experience-based connectivity service rather than just focusing on raw speed.