An on-board fast circuit switch in support of packet switched data services

The deployment of communications satellites with multiple spot beams, in support of fixed satellite services (FSS), has been predicted for some time. It has been recognized that in order to retain connectivity over a wide area, these satellites will need to employ on-board baseband switching. Several concepts for on-board baseband switching have been proposed. However, these systems have been mainly targeted at applications supporting a predominance of voice traffic, and therefore employ circuit switched techniques. With the introduction of new applications, interactive services and inter-LAN communications, the question arises as to how to offer better satellite resource utility in a mixed voice/data/video environment. Work conducted under the sponsorship of the European Space Agency (ESA), has investigated the requirement to introduce packet based services into the ESA Time-Space-Time on-board switch system. The authors review the requirements, the current time-space-time system and then describe an innovative addition to this switch which will support packet switched data traffic by the use of a fast circuit switching technique