2025 Events
March 20, 2025, Thursday – 10AM EST (3PM GMT)
DIFI Webinar: Standard 1.2.1 – The Next Evolution in Digital Ground
Digital ground technology has the potential to reduce costs, increase resilience, unleash innovation and scale up satellite’s share of the IT and telecom market. With many new digital ground technologies reaching the market, this webinar will explore the latest developments in interoperability among them, which will enable all-digital transport and virtualization across all vendor equipment. In February, DIFI’s Specification Working Group finalized version 1.2.1 of the DIFI Standard, receiving Board approval for publication. Building on version 1.2.0, this update brings significant improvements in sync and flow control, further enhancing interoperability and performance. The DIFI Standard continues to drive the shift from analog to digital by providing an open, vendor-neutral Digital IF/RF framework—reducing lock-in and enabling seamless integration across platforms. Join us as we dive into what this latest evolution means for the future of digital ground infrastructure.
Moderator: Simon Swift, Engineering Director, Digital Technologies, ETL Systems & DIFI Director
Panelists:
- Annmarie Stanley, Technical Lead, Kratos Defense and Security Solutions
- Jim Rosenberg, Chief Technical Officer, Wavestream & DIFI Director
- Brian Olson, Engineering Fellow, ARKA
March 10, 2025 – SATSHOW25
DIFI members will be exhibiting technology at SATELLITE 2025 and introducing new products compatible with the DIFI Standard. If you’re attending the show, this list of exhibitors and product introductions will bring you up to speed on the latest in digital ground segment technology. LEARN MORE
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2024 Events
October 28, 2024 – MILCOM 2024 DIFI Workshop
The DIFI Consortium invites members, researchers, and developers to submit ideas for presentations, posters, and demonstrations for the Digital Transformation of SATCOM special workshop during MILCOM 2024. Presentations are requested from users to discuss use cases, lessons learned, or detailed experiments executed using DIFI. Posters/demonstrations should offer technologies, applications, predictions, and viewpoints in the rapidly changing landscape of satellite technology. Demonstrations showing DIFI interoperability are of the highest interest. For more information, email milcom2024@dificonsortium.org
June 17-21, 2024 – DIFI PlugFest 2024 Europe
UK Satellite Applications Catapult’s Harwell Campus is the site of the second DIFI Plugfest, organized by founding member ETL Systems. Member companies test the digital operability of ground segment technology using the DIFI Standard from Monday to Thursday morning, while Thursday afternoon’s Showcase event is open to all and features a keynote, panel session, demonstrations and discussions with the companies testing the interoperability of their products. For information on registration, email plugfest@dificonsortium.org.
March 5, 2024 – WTA & DIFI WEBINAR: Flat Panel Antennas in the Digital Age: Where are the Standards?
It’s the Wild West as far as flat-panel technology is concerned. The pace of innovation has become a barrier to adoption unless the industry can find a standard or an agreed upon, collective approach to get signals on and off the antenna. The innovation in electronically-steerable technology needs interoperability soon. To move this discussion forward World Teleport Association, in association with the Digital Intermediate Frequency Interoperability (DIFI) Consortium, presents a webinar to discuss this issue with flat-panel industry companies and other industry leaders. DIFI recently announced a new working group to focus on the fast-emerging challenge to advancements in ground segment technology and the interoperability challenge it presents. The discussion will address head-on the potential of flat-panel technology, the differences between flat panel management and parabolic management and which standards are necessary to unlock REAL interoperability.
March 5, 2024 – SSPI London Space Business Roundtable
Co-hosted roundtable with Hogan Lovells and The Space and Satellite Professionals International
The theme of the Roundtable will be ‘Opportunities and challenges for a thriving UK commercial space sector’. We are excited to be welcoming Professor Anu Ojha OBE to deliver the keynote speech, which will be followed by a roundtable discussion on creating the most favorable conditions for the commercial space industry in the UK.
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2023 Events
October 30, 2023 – MILCOM 2023 – DIFI Workshop
Following the successful 2022 SATCOM Digital Transformation workshop, the DIFI consortium hosted a full-day 2023 workshop focused on digitization and virtualization in SATCOM. From panel discussions, presentations and posters, attendees learned about version 1.2 of the DIFI standard and its improved synchronization features, the analog IF to DIFI transition, contested SATCOM techniques and enabling virtualized and digitized MILSATCOM.
September 25-29, 2023 – DIFI Plugfest 2023
DIFI held its first PlugFest – where vendors test the interoperability of their products based on version 1.1.0 of the DIFI Standard – at the Kratos Defense & Space offices in Colorado Springs. The 25 engineers attending from member companies tested 13 vendor systems – and despite challenges along the way, nearly 90% were able to communicate, proving the functionality of the standard in providing interoperability among different vendor systems.
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2022 Events
MILCOM 2022 Military Communications Conference
28 November – 2 December 2022 – Founded in 1982, MILCOM has been the preeminent forum bringing together thought leaders in government, industry, and academia to discuss innovative research and cutting edge technology development. Celebrating the 40th year anniversary of MILCOM conference, MILCOM 2022 is themed around “Transforming Decisions Making through Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2)”, building technology pillars in secure communications, resilient networks, multi-domain operations, artificial intelligence and machine learning.
MILCOM 2022 will feature a comprehensive high-quality technical program including five technical tracks, workshops, a variety of technical panels and tutorials, for both unclassified technical program and restricted access technical program. The conference will also feature keynotes and plenary panels with prominent speakers from government, industry and research organizations, as well as vendor exhibition, women’s forum, industry lightning talks, and student poster sessions.
GSAW 2022 – Ground Systems Architectures Workshop
February 23 – March 3, 2022 – The 26th annual Ground System Architectures Workshop (GSAW) provides a forum for the world’s space-related ground system experts to collaborate with other ground system users, developers, and researchers through tutorials, presentations, working groups, panel discussions, and technical exhibits. GSAW will be completely online. To keep everyone safe and to accommodate the growing number of international participants, we will make most GSAW content available on-demand with the ability to comment, ask questions, and share answers.
Stuart Daughtridge, DIFI Consortium Chair will present on Digital IF and DIFI Standards.
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2021 Events
SATELLITE 2021
7-10 September 2021 – National Harbor, MD
In 2021, SATELLITE is celebrating 40 years of bringing you the content, interviews, and discussions that drive innovation and forward progression in the industry. The past twelve months have certainly been unprecedented times when it comes to meeting face to face with other professionals, but one thing that hasn’t wavered is our ability to put forth quality content. As we continue to navigate unchartered waters, we’re committed to bringing you unparalleled value with your SATELLITE registration and expanding your access to the leaders in the satellite community, be it through digital programs or in-person sessions.