Speedcast reaches agreement with Inmarsat to sell primary maritime customer contracts
by Saltwater Stone 26 Nov 2020 04:00 PST
Speedcast International Limited and Inmarsat have announced that they have reached agreement on the sale of Speedcast's primary Fleet Xpress, FleetBroadband and Fleet One service contracts to Inmarsat.
The agreement marks another significant step for Speedcast as it looks to emerge from its Chapter 11 proceedings announced earlier this year, and is subject to approval by the U.S. courts overseeing the company's financial restructuring.
Through the agreement, the Speedcast customers that are transferred to Inmarsat will be assured of continuing access to Inmarsat's market-leading connectivity services. The agreement covers both Speedcast's L-band maritime contracts in which Inmarsat serves as the primary connectivity onboard, as well as the full Inmarsat Fleet Xpress portfolio from Speedcast.
Ronald Spithout, President, Inmarsat Maritime, said: "Our first priority is to ensure that these transitioning Speedcast customers can continue to access Inmarsat's reliable global maritime connectivity services and our growing range of value-added services now and into the future. With Inmarsat's ongoing, fully-funded technology roadmap, these customers, including yachting and passenger customers, will benefit from the next-generation of Ka-band and L-band satellites that we are launching over the next few years. These will provide both additional capacity and capabilities to the network. Among the seven new satellites scheduled for launch in the next few years will be the first ever High Throughput Satellites (HTS) dedicated to the Arctic region."
Andre Eerland, Vice President, Commercial Maritime at Speedcast said: "This agreement enables Speedcast to further strengthen our focus in the maritime sector, delivering our leading global VSAT services, together with global L-band back-up capabilities. We pride ourselves on providing a flexible, high quality service that meets market demands and addresses the challenges of maritime connectivity. Taking this step allows us to consolidate our core connectivity services, which are scalable across all market needs, while remaining at the forefront of the maritime industry."
Speedcast will continue to deliver managed services to its maritime sector clients with primary VSAT and other non-Inmarsat mobile satellite services (MSS) onboard, and will maintain its Inmarsat Distribution Partner status to deliver existing MSS back-up services, with no impact to customer operations or support. Speedcast will also continue to deliver Inmarsat Land MSS services to its enterprise customers as part of the company's land portfolio, with enterprise clients and sites unaffected by this agreement.
Inmarsat will take on management of the transitioned Inmarsat Maritime contracts, as well as the 24/7 operations and support for customers through its network operations and customer support centers. Customers will continue to receive the highest quality of service, with the deal including a fully supported handover to ensure a seamless transition.