I believe that the future of satellite broadband is brighter than it has ever been. The days are receding rapidly when satcoms was considered a niche and, in many respects, an almost invisible industry.
We are entering the era of the always-on, pervasively connected global digital society, fuelled not just by person-to-person interactions, but by both person-to-machine and machine-to-machine interactions. We are becoming a planet where human potential is fundamentally empowered by dense, diverse, interoperable, highly reliable & secure communications networks.  We already see next generation networks transforming a huge variety of markets and bringing the benefits of broadband to billions of people. This process will accelerate with the advent of 5G, which will bring a step-change in coverage, capability, energy consumption, as well as a step-change in IoT services.
This emerging digital society will not be possible or sustainable without satellite communications woven into its infrastructure. Satcoms extends 5G into the seas, the skies and into rural and remote areas. It will add resilience and security to terrestrial networks, and it will add important complementary capabilities such as broadcast, precision navigation and earth observation services. Governments and policy-makers do not want a 5G society only for urban elites, or only for developed economies and a digital society cannot thrive on fragile or unsecure networks. It is the pace of technological innovation in the satellite industry and the growing reliance on connectivity by every nation and every sector of the economy that bodes well for the future of our industry.