Ground station as a service (GSaaS) provider Infostellar has added Nordic firm NorthBase to its network.

The Finnish ground station services provider was announced this week as the newest partner in the StellarStation network.

NorthBase’s Muonio site offers services on S and X bands at 68 degrees northern latitude, providing visibility to polar orbit satellites.

“Partnering with NorthBase adds a very powerful new site to the StellarStation network for the benefit of all our customers,” said Naomi Kurahara, CEO of Infostellar. “At the same time, it strengthens our overall position in Europe, bringing us closer to the clients in the fast-growing European market.”

Founded in 2016, Infostellar owns and operates a teleport in Taiki, Hokkaido. The company is expanding its presence with new sites in Central and Southern Japan.

Operators can access any ground station within Infostellar’s network of more than 28 ground stations via the StellarStation platform. The firm offers capacity across the S-, X-, and Ka-bands, as well as UHF.

“Being part of the StellarStation network is a great opportunity for us. Infostellar has clientele in regions where we have not previously been present, and we, in turn, provide Infostellar customers with an exceptionally good location in Northern Europe. You can take my word when I say there is very little interference and lots of room in Finnish Lapland, and the visibility from 68 degrees north is very good,” added NorthBase chairman, Dr. Tommi Rasila.

NorthBase, founded in 2019, offers satellite ground station and hosting services in Finland. The firm currently operates on two sites, in Muonio and Tampere.

GSaaS provides satellite operators with access to ground stations on a pay-per-use basis, allowing multiple users to book time and capacity on shared antennas, as opposed to buying their own. Startup GSaaS providers include Leaf Space, RBC Signals, Atlas Space Operations, and eNexus, as well as incumbents such as KSAT and AWS.

This year has seen Infostellar announce ground station partnerships with South Korean ground station firm Contec, Japanese provider Astro Gate, India’s Dhruva Space, and Sat.IO.

Last year, the company announced plans to deploy a network of Infostellar-owned antennas serving clients in the Asia Pacific Region. Set to go live in the second half of this year, planned locations include Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, and New Zealand.

Infostellar is supporting Panasonic Group’s Curtis demonstration satellite via a ground station in Gifu, Japan, owned by Kawasaki Heavy Industries (KHI); a ground station in Azerbaijan owned by Azercosmos; and ground stations in Africa (Cape Town) and the Middle East (Bahrain) through Amazon’s AWS Ground Station service.