Telesat advances Telesat Lightspeed terrestrial network with new Quebec and Saskatchewan landing station sites
Press Release + Long Noah Note
OTTAWA, ONTARIO– March 10, 2026 – Telesat (Nasdaq and TSX: TSAT), one of the world’s largest and most innovative satellite operators, announced the acquisition of land in Estevan, Saskatchewan and Papineauville, Quebec, and the lease of land in Shaunavon, Saskatchewan. These sites will host new landing stations that will route data between the Telesat Lightspeed Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite network and major fibre and internet exchange points. The geographically diverse locations enhance network resiliency and performance for the satellite network.
As the largest space program in Canada’s history, Telesat Lightspeed will expand the reach of terrestrial telecom networks and help bridge the digital divide by delivering secure, high‑speed broadband connectivity worldwide. These landing stations will help enable sovereign, next‑generation digital services and support Canada’s economic growth, while reinforcing the protection of Arctic and northern territories.
“Telesat is rapidly advancing the global buildout of the terrestrial infrastructure that will be fully integrated with our LEO satellites, and these Quebec and Saskatchewan sites are playing pivotal roles in that progress,” said Asit Tandon, Telesat’s Chief Network and Information Officer. “These strategically located facilities strengthen connectivity across Canada and contribute to the worldwide terrestrial foundation we are establishing ahead of our first satellite launch in December.”
Site preparation is now underway. The Quebec landing station is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 2026 with the Saskatchewan sites to follow by year end.
Noah Note: This makes station four and five for Telesat. The third station was announced back in October. That will be just outside Timmins, Ontario. Telesat will also build new landing stations in New South Wales, Australia in partnership with Vocus and at Orange's teleport in Bercenay-en- Othe France.
There should be more coming soon, especially as we get closer to Lightspeed's first trache in December, the infrastructure for which is slowly getting gathered together as you can see.
To remind everyone who might not know: Lightspeed is Telesat's newest enterprise-class, high-throughput LEO constellation. Lightspeed is a fully regenerative space-based mesh network that delivers fiber-like latency and multi-gigabit throughput to any point on Earth, including polar regions, while maintaining MEF 3.0 Carrier Ethernet standards.
Comprising 198 satellites operating in a hybrid mix of polar (~1,000 km) and inclined (~1,325 km) orbital planes, each satellite is equipped with four Optical Inter-Satellite Links (OISLs), creating a compliant Layer 2 mesh network in space. This allows data to route directly between satellites via laser links, bypassing ground gateways until the traffic reaches its final destination or an optimal peering point.
The network delivers robust, carrier-grade performance specifications, including round-trip latency as low as 30-50 ms and single-terminal speeds reaching 7.5 Gbps downlink and 1 Gbps uplink.
Lightspeed will represent a Sovereign, Canadian-made, Canadian-controlled constellation able to provide the Canadian government and CAF with a domestic option for global connectivity. It's one of those projects where despite the struggle, I am still very much happy to see come to fruition. Canadian Space companies have continued to make strides in building up an independent capacity to support Canada’s Space security.
In recent months Canada has been active in building out this foundation, far more than I expected. This includes government mivement but also some private accomplishments. Among these include:
Multiple new contracts to support the SpaceLEO Initiative to C-Core, Kepler, Galaxia, and the University of Victoria
The Launching of the Launch the North challenge to support a Canadian Domestic Launch capability. This should hopefully be releasing results soon.
This is also not speaking in several active procurements related to space currently working in the pipeline including Surveillance of Space 2, which now has RFI out for both the Ground and Space-based Optical Capabilities out and working through the pipeline.
If you're in the Space industry, or even just a fan, this year has been a monumental shift in an area that Canada has for long allowed our contributions to degrade. Canada is and has always been a Space innovator. We have always been at the forefront of Space throughout the Cold War.
It was Canada that put the first domestic communications satellite into space with Anik-1. In fact, the Anik series would accomplish many firsts, such as being the world's first dual-band communications satellite with Anik-B. Canada was the third country to send a domestic satellite into space with Alouette-I.
We have the ability to do so much here, and it warms my heart as a space kid who was told that people didn't care, that there was no future to see Canada start to talk this industry seriously. Beside my own bias, it is a critical need to have a healthy space industry able to support Canada’s security ecosystem independently of allies. These won't change the world. These investments won't make us a Space power.
They will help make us independent of others, and build an industry that can support Canadian objectives and needs. That alone is a critical capacity very few people have, and one that we can be proud of having.
Fantastic news! Let’s keep this pace and innovation going for the next decades.