GSE Blog 

Growing business in the satellite industry can be an incredibly daunting challenge. For most, it means either racing other companies to capitalize on better hardware opportunities, competing in a globally open software provider market, or generally existing with the goal of expansion when the primary market (people and places that lack reliable communications) shrinks with every new 5G tower, fiber line, and infrastructure project. This industry is mature, and surviving in it means identifying opportunities for growth that capitalize on collaborative potential.

Capturing Missed Opportunities

Every company has a number of opportunities that were missed due to the client's budget. When RFP/RFQ processes occur, there is very often an all or nothing criteria that stipulates a total budget and total number of nodes for a specified duration. Any solution that doesn't satisfy all of those needs won't be considered, as there is a minimum threshold for tracked nodes. It is very often the case that companies will miss these opportunities by less than 1% of the total budget, but they have no way of knowing.

How it Happens

An example of this missed RFP scenario is a university research project that wants to track a herd of antelope for 2 years with a budget of $400,000. Tracking a percentage of the animals doesn't satisfy the University's requirements for sample size, so it's an all or nothing bid. Nearly everyone can agree that $400,000 is a massive budget for this project, but companies restricted by hardware options, software license costs, or airtime plan availability might not be able to adjust margins to fit that budget.

Some companies can satisfy this RFP from a hardware and airtime perspective, but lack a software solution that can be resold without cutting into margins somewhere else. Others might be limited by their portfolio's hardware costs or airtime packages. Each of these scenarios is a real reason for failed bids, and each is entirely avoidable if companies could expand their portfolio with different options.

Managing Margins

To avoid missing out on these projects, it is important to have flexible margins at a total cost per unit level, then adjust the proposed technology package to match the per unit cost that will best satisfy the RFP and benefit the business. The only way to achieve this goal is to have a wide variety of hardware, software, and airtime options available, including both high performance and low cost options for each.

Success is about being able to provide high margin solutions for low volume clients while also providing low margin solutions for high volume clients. Most companies restrict their business and therefore their growth opportunities by specializing in one or the other. As the satellite industry continues to mature, that kind of specialization will position more and more companies with unrealizable growth goals.

Collaborate with GSE

To put it simply, GSE is really good at developing products that make tracking and remote work possible. Each hardware terminal in our portfolio exists because there was a massive gap in the market when that product was introduced, and GSE found a way to leverage its engineering expertise to close the gap. What many people don't realize is that all of GSE's hardware terminals are available for private white labeling and direct resale to anyone who wants to expand their own technology portfolios without the investment in R&D.

GSatSolar Series

The GSatSolar Series is the newest addition to the GSE arsenal, and helps both GSE and its partners satisfy the needs of high volume basic tracking clients with an incredibly low-cost terminal. The original GSatSolar isn't right for everything, but there's no competition in the market for the solutions it's best designed to provide.

As the product line grows, GSE expects the GSatSolar to become one of the most widely used terminals for massive IoT, non-CAN fleet tracking, and wildlife tracking. Wherever the market can find opportunities for location based services with low-intelligence terminals (not everything needs to run advanced processes on the edge), the GSatSolar will be the benchmark for both performance and price.

We even made a really sweet video about how cool the GSatSolar Series is:

GSatRancher

The GSatRancher is part of the GSatSolar Series, and is specifically designed and priced to satisfy the needs of those interested in GPS Ear Tag tracking for their cattle. Currently, GSatRancher competes with only one other provider in the market, whose price point is nearly twice that of the GSatRancher. Wise resellers would have both options in their portfolio as a means of catering to all of their clients' needs.

For those clients who wish to use a different software tool than GSatTrack (which is included in the per unit cost of the GSatRancher), GSE can work with the developers of those software tools to set up data relay via API. At the end of the day, it's all about getting as many animals tracked with the cattle owner's budget as possible, and having access to the lowest cost terminal on the market is a must for anyone interested in selling GPS Ear Tags.

Let's Talk

GSE is constantly growing its partner network, and is actively seeking companies that fit into the following high-synergy profiles.

• General Resellers

  Definitely reach out to us if you're in the business of selling tracking solutions of any kind, especially if your hardware or software portfolio could be stronger. If you're looking for growth, it will come from finding new opportunities that accompany the cost-free expansion of your product offerings.

• Software Developers

  If you develop software that helps people organize and visualize their tracked assets, your entire business is about getting as many assets tracked as possible. The volume business requires low cost terminals, so whether you sell everything, or work with companies who sell your solution, make sure the sellers have access to a low cost terminal like GSatSolar.

• Network Providers

  The GSatSolar series is not locked to a particular network, and GSE is capable of developing a new terminal that works with any modem. One thing is certain: you don't want to be the only network that doesn't have a terminal like the GSatSolar available.

• Hardware Providers

  GSE doesn't want to compete with you. If you're going to develop a terminal to compete with the GSatSolar Series, why not just work with us to white label and save the R&D costs? Oh, and if you don't make your own software, every terminal GSE produces comes standard with GSatTrack. We can make GSatTrack the standard software license for your terminals, too. People love it when they don't have to go to multiple sources to buy the components of a complete solution.

Working with GSE is the best way to immediately expand your hardware and software portfolio with best in class solutions that also offer tremendous resale margin potential. Recovering Research and Development costs alone is enough reason to adopt GSE products, but for a list of additional reasons, one need only consider GSE's reputation as a premier engineering firm in the satellite industry, and read into the ways in which our innovative solutions have resulted in a number of "firsts" for the clients we have served in our nearly two-decade history. For more information, please Contact us any time.