New Gogo Deal Means Faster In-Flight Wi-Fi From Pole to Pole

Following a series of competitive leaps in the Wi-Fi space race in recent weeks, Gogo announces that it has struck a deal to cover the globe with high-speed Wi-Fi.

Gogo and Intelsat have signed a long-term agreement which promises to give Gogo’s customers access to next generation in-flight connectivity, powered by a high performance shared network with multi-layered Ku-band capacity.

The deal gives Gogo access to Intelsat’s EpicNG high throughput geosynchronous (GEO) satellites combined with OneWeb’s planned low earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation. The contiguous network consists of 50 satellites covering 99% of the world’s populated regions.

That’s a lot of satellite speak. But as Steve Nolan Vice President, Communications at Gogo explains, it means more high-speed Wi-Fi virtually anywhere you fly.

“It means lots more bandwidth and significantly lower costs to our airline partners and ultimately passengers,” he says. “It also means coverage from gate to gate, pole to pole.”

“Our 2Ku technology was built to take advantage of the innovations happening in space over time, and this deal is a great example of that,” Nolan adds. “It means that once we install 2Ku, it will continuously get better, leveraging the massive innovations in space without having to touch an aircraft for a long time.”

Gogo says the new Intelsat satellite network deal delivers a unique competitive advantage, by delivering readily upgradable systems, with a one-time antenna installation. The in-flight connectivity company will buy additional capacity on the Intelsat Globalized Network’s Ku-band infrastructure in 2016.

“By building our network and technologies to be open with the ability to leverage any and all innovations in space,” Nolan says. “We’ve built a technology that’s as future proof as we believe you can get.”