‘Business aviation fastest growing segment for flat panel antennas’

opinion

by Fayaz Hussain

May 7, 2026

Despite LEO’s dominance in aviation today, the report’s authors believe multi-network capability will become increasingly important.

Business aviation is on course to be the fastest growing segment within aviation for flat panel antenna shipments over the next decade as passenger expectations for in-flight connectivity continue to rise, according to new research from Valour Consultancy.

The firm’s second edition of its ‘Future of Flat Panel Antennas’ report, published in April 2026, forecasts close to 10,000 flat panel antennas by 2035.

The segment is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 45% throughout the forecast period.

“Out of the aviation sectors within the scope of the study, we are seeing the fastest growth in business aviation,” Arabella Kearney, co-author of the report, tells Corporate Jet Investor.

“Customer expectations drive high growth in this sector for faster service and the use of higher bandwidth applications such as video streaming and live call capabilities. This is especially prominent since SpaceX entered the market in 2022 and showcased [Low Earth Orbit] LEO’s high performance and low latency across a range of larger business aircraft.”

North America is expected to account for around 5,500 of those units, driven by the prevalence of large cabin jets used on long-haul routes such as transatlantic travel.

“North America is the region most primed for adoption. Expansion throughout the forecast period is supported by the size and range capabilities of large cabin jets, which are commonly used for long-haul routes such as transatlantic travel, where passengers expect reliable onboard connectivity,” she added.

The broader flat panel antenna market, which business aviation forms a part, has shifted considerably since Valour Consultancy’s first edition of this report in 2023. In the first edition, the firm forecasted shipments across all communications on the move (COTM) applications to reach 100,000 by 2030.

That figure has now been revised sharply upward, with the firm projecting close to 500,000 units across aviation, land mobility and maritime by 2035, with land mobility emerging as the fastest growing vertical overall following a relatively slow start.

At the time of the original study, most antennas were yet to enter early-stage production, the competitive landscape lacked maturity and end-users remained cautious about the merits of LEO connectivity. Those barriers have largely disappeared.

“Confidence in LEO connectivity has increased substantially, to the extent end-users now prioritise solutions that deliver low latency, resilience and redundancy,” said Kearney.

“The price of hardware has also fallen dramatically thanks to continued advances in the semiconductor space, as well as better economies of scale in production. This has allowed the ARPU to fall to a level that has expanded the addressable market in both the land mobility and maritime sectors earlier than expected.”

The competitive landscape has also evolved significantly, with SpaceX, Intellian, Kymeta, Thinkom, LiteComs, ALL.SPACE, Requtech AB and Gilat Satellite Networks all actively shipping to customers. In parallel, consolidation has accelerated, with BAE Systems acquiring Ball Aerospace, Gilat Satellite Networks acquiring Stellar Blu for its SideWinder solution and Thales acquiring Get SAT among the notable transactions of recent years.

Despite LEO’s dominance in aviation today, the report’s authors believe multi-network capability will become increasingly important.

Report’s co-author Daniel Welch argues the future lies in more open, multi-network hardware, pointing to trends already visible in maritime and military sectors as a sign of where business aviation is likely to follow.

“Sovereignty and redundancy are two themes that dominated discussions with end-users and service providers throughout the fieldwork. Both factors are expected to drive adoption of hardware capable of connecting to multiple networks rather than becoming reliant on a single network,” he said.

The report was developed with input from more than 30 companies across the value chain and covers unit shipments and revenue projections across aviation, land mobility and maritime through to 2035.