Airbus Defence and Space has secured a contract from Eutelsat to manufacture a further 340 low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites for the OneWeb constellation, expanding a previous order placed in December 2024. With this latest contract, Eutelsat has now ordered...
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Airbus Defence and Space has secured a contract from Eutelsat to manufacture a further 340 low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites for the OneWeb constellation, expanding a previous order placed in December 2024.
With this latest contract, Eutelsat has now ordered a total of 440 satellites from Airbus, including the earlier batch of 100.
The new spacecraft are intended to maintain operational continuity of the OneWeb network by progressively replacing satellites approaching the end of their design life.
Manufacturing will take place at Airbus Defence and Space’s satellite production facility in Toulouse, where a new production line has been installed for the programme.
Deliveries are scheduled to begin towards the end of 2026.
OneWeb operates a LEO satellite constellation providing broadband connectivity with low latency worldwide. The network currently consists of more than 600 satellites deployed across 12 coordinated orbital planes at an altitude of around 1,200 km. The constellation is designed to deliver internet services to enterprise, government, aviation, maritime and remote users globally.
The newly ordered satellites will incorporate several technical upgrades compared with earlier generations. These include advanced digital channelisers that enable greater onboard processing, as well as improvements aimed at increasing efficiency and operational flexibility. The satellite architecture has been optimised to support longer-term performance and reliability.
Eutelsat is also assessing the potential use of the new satellites for additional missions, including the accommodation of hosted payloads. Such capabilities could allow third-party customers to deploy specialised instruments or communications equipment alongside OneWeb’s primary payloads.
Airbus has been involved in the OneWeb programme for several years, supplying satellites for earlier deployment phases. The additional order reinforces Airbus’s role as a principal industrial partner in the development and sustainment of the constellation.
OneWeb became part of Eutelsat following the merger of the two companies in 2023, combining Eutelsat’s geostationary satellite operations with OneWeb’s LEO network. The expanded satellite order reflects ongoing efforts by Eutelsat to maintain service availability while updating the constellation with newer technologies as earlier spacecraft are phased out.
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