Orange and Telesat Commission First European Gateway for Lightspeed LEO Network

Orange and Telesat have commissioned the first European gateway for the Telesat Lightspeed constellation, establishing a key part of the LEO network's ground infrastructure ahead of its planned commercial introduction in 2028.

The gateway is located at Orange's Tier-4 certified teleport in Bercenay-en-Othe, France, and will support Telesat's planned initial constellation of 225 satellites. Orange will provide high-speed terrestrial connectivity between the gateway and Telesat's planned point of presence in Paris, integrating the satellite infrastructure with European terrestrial networks.

The site uses gateway antennas supplied by Intellian Technologies and will form part of Lightspeed's wider ground architecture. Telesat is designing the constellation with onboard processing and optical inter-satellite links, allowing traffic to be routed between satellites before reaching a Telesat gateway or a customer's private landing facility. The architecture is aimed particularly at enterprise, telecom, government and defence customers requiring low latency, resilient routing and greater control over where data enters terrestrial networks.

For Orange, the deployment expands the role of its Bercenay-en-Othe teleport as a host for next-generation satellite systems and creates scope to integrate Lightspeed capacity into its wider connectivity portfolio. Telesat said it is also exploring additional cooperation with Orange that could extend services to customers in Europe, Africa and other markets.