Summary

  • On 30 October 2026 Ofcom removed a gateway application rule that capped total authorised receive bandwidth at the amount of transmit bandwidth. The regulator says the ratio is no longer necessary.
  • Existing NGSO gateway licensees can request extra receive bandwidth through an OfW564 variation. Coexistence and competition checks still govern the decision.

An earth station can need a wider ear than mouth. Until last week, Ofcom's application guidance made that design awkward: the total spectrum a non-geostationary satellite gateway proposed to receive could not exceed the total it proposed to transmit. The March guidance, paragraph 1.30, said Ofcom would accept applications satisfying that ratio. It was an admission test on authorised MHz, not a measurement of how many bits customers sent or received.

Ofcom's 30 October licensing-page update removes the requirement. The new guidance's document history identifies the deletion of paragraph 1.30 as version 1.4's change. Ofcom offers no long technical defence of the old symmetry test; it simply says it no longer considers the rule necessary. That is a consequential sentence for anyone designing a gateway with more downlink spectrum than uplink spectrum.

The distinction matters because the gateway is the bridge between a satellite constellation and an internet or private network. The gateway licence covers that earth station; a separate network licence covers user terminals. In the new guidance, the gateway's receive frequencies are still placed in its licence schedule. Removing the arithmetic ceiling does not add a frequency to any existing licence by itself. Ofcom directs current licensees who want more receive bandwidth to seek a variation on form OfW564. A new applicant uses the same form with deployment spreadsheets.

The gate that remains is operational. Applicants must show how a gateway can coexist with UK-licensed NGSO systems, published pending systems and specified co-frequency earth stations in the ITU register. Ofcom also assesses competitive effects. It normally decides gateway applications without a public consultation, but can open one when a site's scale, location or competing demand raises material concerns. The ratio once let a simple number reject a design before that fuller inquiry. The new process leaves more room for asymmetric designs and more work for site-specific evidence.

No operator's new variation is identified in the update. The next useful proof is an OfW564 decision and its licence schedule showing approved receive and transmit bands, followed by any coexistence conditions. A change in permitted spectrum can make a gateway design possible; traffic capacity and customer service require the equipment and network to run.