Ivan de Baere, Vice President of Intuition Architecture, will represent ST Engineering iDirect as a board member of the WAVE Consortium.
ST Engineering iDirect has been selected as a board member for the newly established Waveform Architecture for Virtualised Ecosystems (WAVE) Consortium. ST Engineering iDirect joins a growing group of board members with a common vision for a future where satellite communication networks are built on agile, scalable and cost-effective commodity-based infrastructure, driving rapid innovation in network services and operations.
The WAVE Consortium, established in March 2024, comes at a pivotal moment as the satellite communications industry undergoes a transformative shift to align with the telecommunications sector. This alignment aims to extend the reach and opportunities for satellite communications to meet the constantly evolving connectivity demands. ST Engineering iDirect set out on a mission to respond to this change with its recent announcement of Intuition, a virtualised, cloud-native, standards-based ground system that will foster an open, interoperable ecosystem to move the industry past its traditional growth constraints.
The involvement with the WAVE Consortium will bring this vision to reality, uniting strategic partners, customers and competitors across the ecosystem. By prioritising industry collaboration, these efforts will ensure that technologies evolve to meet the needs of a fully connected world.
Ivan de Baere, Vice President of Intuition Architecture, will represent ST Engineering iDirect as a WAVE Consortium board member. With over two decades of satcom experience, de Baere has been key in driving standards-based approaches since his work with the DVB-standards body. He joins a lineup of fellow members that include Amazon Web Services (AWS), Comtech, Intelsat, Microsoft, Reticulate Micro, and SES.
Sridhar Kuppanna, SVP of Engineering, ST Engineering iDirect, said: “As a business, we have a long history of driving standards-based approaches. Yet, as an industry, this journey to embrace standards and move towards a collaborative, open and interoperable future is in its infancy. In our new role as a board member of the WAVE Consortium, we look forward to driving these discussions forward, working alongside customers, partners and competitors across the ecosystem. Together, it’s our ambition to bring this ongoing, shared vision to life, revolutionizing satellite communications to enable our customers to interoperate seamlessly, deploy effortlessly, orchestrate efficiently and scale rapidly for the future.”
Anirban Chakraborty, Chairman, WAVE Board of Directors, added: “WAVE consortium aims to accelerate the SATCOM industry beyond proprietary systems to foster innovation, collaboration, and resilience, adapting swiftly to global needs. ST Engineering iDirect is one of the key players in the industry and their inclusion as a Board member will certainly benefit the ecosystem at large. We look forward to their contributions towards driving standardisation into a collaborative and interoperable future.”
