Satellite internet is rising in prominence as an option for providing high-speed connectivity to locations outside the reach of traditional cable or dialup infrastructure. Although the industry has endured some challenges and attained a negative reputation over the years—because of cost concerns and lackluster performance—the market has rallied as costs have decreased and as private access to space has increased. Customers at home and in corporate airspace are now finding that satellite internet can be faster (sometimes much faster) than typical methods, offers high bandwidth without compromise, and—of course—doesn’t rely on a terrestrial tether to deliver the goods.
On the bleeding edge of this market evolution is Viasat, which has led the industry with the bold vision of its own satellite system. “The innovations we’re making across our satellite system allow us to do extraordinary things,” says Mark Dankberg, Viasat’s chairman and CEO, “from moving the satellite industry upmarket by delivering premium services, speeds, and plans that give consumers new choices in their internet service provider, to helping bridge the digital divide in the United States today.”
Viasat leads the satellite market through a combination of differentiators. The company is vertically integrated, owning everything in its network—from design to chips to satellites—as well as owning and managing the ground infrastructure. Thanks to this visibility into the entire network, Viasat can make vital adjustments far more quickly than other satellite providers, who must rely on third parties for repairs, upgrades, and modifications. Viasat engineers are also highly attuned to users’ real-world pain points—for example, data usage for mobile customers and the need for a sleek user experience.
Key to that enhanced user experience is Viasat’s optimized, intelligent internet browser. The Viasat Browser is a browser that learns—not about individual user activity but rather about the structure of the internet and websites. By thinking about the internet differently, Viasat creates a significantly better browsing experience for our customers. It does this by using artificial intelligence that continuously learns from the anonymized data about the content and structure of webpages so it can render them in a better, faster way.
Viasat’s crowdsourcing technology also continues to make internet browsing better and faster because the more people use it, the more and better data it has to make constant improvements to customers’ web browsing experience. In this sense, the more people who use the browser, the better it continues to be.
The Viasat Browser also provides sophisticated ad-blocker technology and a built-in Data Saver Mode that blocks data-intensive streams from preloading, preventing inadvertent data consumption. And it provides extra layers of privacy and security protection, blocking malicious links and website traffic. It’s about giving users more control and, overall, a superior internet browsing experience.
The Viasat Browser will enhance the user experience of any internet service but is especially effective when coupled with satellite service. In addition to home internet, Viasat plans to use its ViaSat 3 constellation satellite system which will begin to launch in 2020 and offer the entire planet high-speed internet access with data speeds as fast as 1 terabit per second.