Cables and Satellites
Subsea and terrestrial cables, landing stations, satellite connectivity.
Stories
Explainer
Kazakhstan's ministries name SES for an Air Astana jet, Starlink for trains
Official texts tie SES to one Air Astana jet and Starlink to 59 trains, schools and phones; orbits, licences and contracts are largely unstated.
Brief
Air Astana flies its first satellite Wi-Fi aircraft to Tashkent with SES
Access is free for every passenger until 31 January 2027, then paid for most, and the rest of the A321LR fleet is fitted through 2027.
Explainer
Kazakhstan's Starlink terms, and its plan to serve neighbours through local gateways
Official documents trace a school pilot, a 2025 compliance agreement and a direct-to-phone launch, but not the licence conditions that may now matter beyond Kazakhstan.
Explainer
Türkiye has not authorised LEO satellite broadband, and Turkcell lists a change as a risk
Turkcell's 20-F says LEO internet needs legislative approval in Türkiye and could substitute for its services. Kazakhstan took the opposite route in 2025.
Tajikistan opens a fibre route to China over the Kulma pass with up to 1 Tbps at the start
Tajiktelecom and China Mobile International opened the Dushanbe to Beijing line on 17 October, more than two weeks after the date officials had set; no cost, financing or wholesale price has been published.
Explainer
Trans-Caspian corridor, part 4: the transit market the cable enters, and its prices
Kazakhstan's main carrier lists 1.5 Tbit/s of transit channels set up in 2024 and a revised price list; neither that list nor a Caspian tariff is public.
Four Turkic states sign a preliminary space agreement in Antalya
OTS-SAT's launch has moved from a 2026 target to 2027, and no account gives a budget, a cost-sharing formula or a launch provider.
Analysis
Türksat's deals span satellites, a data centre and China, few terms public
Releases and reports from March to October give no investment figures, capacity splits or launch dates, and the Gölbaşı campus is rated at 33 MVA, not MW.
Brief
Kazakhstan cites 72bn tenge KazSat revenue and plans six imaging satellites
The government's 6 October summary also lists three export projects worth $70 million but gives no period for the revenue figure.
Analysis
Kazakhstan left broadband off KazSat-3R on cost grounds
A government reply put an expanded Ku- and Ka-band payload at 153 billion tenge, and in October Starlink and OneWeb moved to commercial licences.
Explainer
Trans-Caspian corridor, part 3: who will sell the cable's capacity
The 380 km Aktau to Sumgayit line is run by a joint venture and built with operators' own money. Price, lit capacity and access terms are not in the launch documents.
Kazakhstan licenses Starlink and OneWeb for commercial service
Amazon Leo and Shanghai SpaceSail are expected to follow in 2027, the digital minister told Kurultai deputies, but the report gives no licence terms.
Kazakhstan and CONTEC discuss a satellite component hub and ground stations
The 14 September meeting gave no investment figure; South Korea's CONTEC is to register a Kazakh subsidiary and cites 17 ground stations worldwide.
Laid
Kazakhstan says half of 4,511 km West-East fibre route is laid
The government targets commissioning before the end of 2026 for a transit backbone that a ministry description puts at a design capacity of at least 12 Tbps.
Explainer
Trans-Caspian corridor, part 2: the landing points and the links beyond them
The documents name Aktau and Sumgayit as the cable's ends but no landing station, and the path west of the Caspian runs through Georgia with no published route.
Armenia plans at least three satellites and a ground station network
Prime Minister Pashinyan told a Paris summit on 10 September the plan covers two Earth observation satellites and one for telecoms; no cost or launch date was given.
Beeline Kazakhstan launches Starlink satellite-to-mobile service
The operator says standard smartphones can reach apps and messaging outside terrestrial coverage, free during an initial period.
Analysis
Corridor Capacity Tracker, October 2026: the Caspian and Black Sea routes
Five subsea systems, announced against lit or initial capacity, with a source in every cell; only two of the five have a published lit or initial figure.
Explainer
Trans-Caspian corridor, part 1: the route from Aktau to Sumgayit and beyond
The first fibre line across the Caspian runs about 380 km between Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, and officials describe a path on to Europe through Georgia.
