Nokia teamed with microsatellite firm ICEYE to develop “sovereign” satellite systems for low-Earth orbit (LEO).

The pair will jointly develop communications systems targeting governments, defense, and disaster response. The effort has a Euro-centric lean to it, with their announcement claiming it would “give nations ownership and control of the satellites, ground segment, and terminals.”

The first of the jointly developed satellites are expected to be launched in 2028.

“Sovereign operations depend on the ability to sense, decide, and act in real time. Physical AI makes that possible, but only with secure, resilient connectivity across land, sea, air, and space,” Nokia CEO Justin Hotard noted.

Nokia has long been targeting the growing sovereign space, with it recently unveiling a unified edge computing platform for many of the same sectors it’s targeting with this latest satellite connectivity option.

The networking giant is now set to push into the edge of the edge with a fellow Finnish firm. ICEYE is based in Espoo, the same city as Nokia’s headquarters, with the pair just a 10-minute drive apart.

Nokia counts among the satellite firm’s investors, having taken part in a Series F funding round this summer that surpassed $1.1 billion. Other ICEYE backers include Solidium, General Atlantic, and Qatar's QIA sovereign wealth fund.

ICEYE is already taking advantage of European demand for sovereign satellite infrastructure to counter U.S. dominance via Starlink and, more recently, Amazon Leo. In August, it agreed to sell Earth observation satellites to Poland’s Ministry of National Defense, with a launch scheduled for November.

Its effort with Nokia will look to develop satellite systems capable of providing high-throughput, low-latency connectivity over priority mission areas – an effort the pair said would “complement” military and commercial networks rather than replace them.

“Nations must be able to fully own and control their communications, without dependency on a foreign commercial operator’s terms of service. We delivered Poland its own radar satellite system in under a year,” ICEYE CEO Rafal Modrzewski explained. “Partnering with Nokia lets us move at a similar speed for satellite communications, on the timelines nations need.”

“By bringing together Nokia's trusted networks with ICEYE’s proven sovereign space capabilities, we will deliver a satellite communications capability – complementing existing terrestrial networks, and giving nations the situational awareness, connectivity, and control they need to operate with confidence in contested environments across all domains,” Hotard added.