The O3b satellite network comprises multiple satellites in orbit directly above the equator. They are at 8064 km altitude and are moving eastwards. As satellites set in the east, others rise in the west. To operate you need 2 tracking antennas.
The satellite has 12 tracking antennas, each pointing at an earth station.



The image above is intended to give an impression of how it works. See http://www.satsig.net/O3b/O3b-orbit.htm for an animation.

Eric

The O3b network is not intended to provide service in the polar regions. Its satellites orbit along above the equator and are not visible from the polar regions.

There are sufficient satellites in the O3b network to provide continuous service in the intended service area, plus and minus either way from the equator, and there are at least 2 visible satellites above the horizon at any time.

See this page and picture http://www.satsig.net/africa/algeria/vsat-installer-o3b-algeria.htm


Each earth station site has two tracking antennas.

My animation only shows a limited number of satellite. In reality there are more satellites around and above the equator, always moving eastwards.

Beyond the north and south extremes of the 24/7 coverage area, satellites will be visible for short periods and further north or south, not visible at all. Run the simulation and look to see where are the north-south latitude limits of the coverage. Experiment by increasing or reducing the simulated satellite height.

The key advantage of the O3b network is its low latency (low time delay) due to its lower orbit distance as compared with geo-stationary. Latency affects the standard two-way internet protocol, making web pages slower to load. For geo satellites special protocols are used to speed up web pages and downloads. A web page may suffer second or so initial delay and then suddenly the whole lot comes quickly.

O3b is similar to terrestrial fibre, both with regard to short latency and also very high speed bit rates. It is attractive to ISPs serving towns, communities, large cruise ships etc.

Best regards, Eric.

Sorry Admin1
Actually I made the comment on the basis of 5 satellites those you showed. Thanks for clarifying the secret.

I too would be very interested in a price comparison between GEO, GEO-HTS, MEO and LEO systems, and cable.

To get started here are a few thoughts about O3b. Regarding financials, I read this from 10 Dec 2015.

http://spacenews.com/o3b-orders-eight-more-satellites-from-thales-alenia-space/

Each O3b satellite has 10 customer spot beams. Each customer beam has one transponder with 215 MHz bandwidth. Assuming 8PSK modulation and 3/4 FEC, each customer beam provides a download bit rate of 486 Mbit/s.

The reference above hopes that each satellite will produce $35 million revenue per year. That is $3.5 million per beam per year or $291,000 per month or $600 per Mbit/s per month. Is that calculation right ?

Each customer therefore needs to pay $291,000 per month and gets the full 486 Mbit/s and this then needs to be shared out locally amongst other people in the local town, island, community, cruise ship or aircraft carrier etc.  486 Mbit/s is good for some 13,800 domestic end user customers each paying $35 per month. So customer total income = $483,000 per month, which more than pays for the satellite capacity.

This is all assuming the maximum 13,800 end users per customer. Once you start to consider the start up and growth phase with fewer end user customers you get worse results.

Does any of this make sense ?