To Share, or Not to Share: A Study on GEO-LEO Systems for IoT Services with Random Access

Abstract

The increasing number of satellite deployments, both in the low and geostationary Earth orbit exacerbates the already ongoing scarcity of wireless resources when targeting ubiquitous connectivity. For the aim of supporting a massive number of IoT devices characterized by bursty traffic and modern variants of random access, we pose the following question: Should competing satellite operators share spectrum resources or is an exclusive allocation preferable? This question is addressed by devising a communication model for two operators which serve overlapping coverage areas with independent IoT services. Analytical approximations, validated by Monte Carlo simulations, reveal that spectrum sharing can yield significant throughput gains for both operators under certain conditions tied to the relative serviced user populations and coding rates in use. These gains are sensitive also to the system parameters and may not always render the spectral coexistence mutually advantageous. Our model captures basic trade-offs in uplink spectrum sharing and provides novel actionable insights for the design and regulation of future 6G non-terrestrial networks.