During the study last year, Daniel Goldberg, the president and CEO of Telesat Canada, told the committee about Telesat's activities in the context of broadband access in rural and remote regions. He noted that the current satellites are too deep in space to provide high capacity, low-latency service and that Telesat had some plans to develop a network of low-earth orbit satellites—I think the term is “LEOs”—to increase its satellite-based Internet capacity. This would give users access to broadband services equivalent to fibre, as you were just speaking to, as well as wireless LTE and 5G services.
Mr. Goldberg said that he expected construction of these satellites to begin in early 2021 and the system to be ready for beta testing in 2023.
Can you tell us if the CRTC has seen evidence of this project developing and how a successful deployment of LEOs could change access for northern and rural communities?