Ukraine is moving to put more of its wartime communications under Ukrainian control. On 22 October, ICEYE and Nokia signed a Letter of Intent with Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence to explore cooperation on sovereign satellite communications, announced during the Finnish Prime Minister’s visit to Ukraine.
What the Partnership Covers
Earlier in October, ICEYE and Nokia announced that they would jointly develop secure, high-performance broadband systems using low Earth orbit satellites for governments. The proposed systems are intended to support defence and border security, as well as emergency services and disaster response.
Their design goes beyond buying access to a signal. ICEYE and Nokia say nations would own and control the satellites, the ground infrastructure and the terminals. Each part matters. A satellite without control of its ground segment is not full autonomy. Nor is a network whose users depend on terminals governed by someone else’s decisions. Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence has now signed on to explore how that approach could support its own defence needs.
This is European technology being developed for governments that want sovereign communications. For Ukraine, the practical test will be whether cooperation produces a dependable system it can direct in wartime, including when terrestrial networks are damaged or cut.
ICEYE’s Role
ICEYE has been involved in Ukraine’s defence effort before. Its CEO and co-founder, Rafal Modrzewski, says the company has supported Ukraine since 2022. He points to ICEYE’s experience delivering sovereign space missions quickly and says Ukraine needs a secure, high-performance satellite communications system under its own control.
That record gives the Letter of Intent more substance than a first meeting between unfamiliar partners. Settling whether a shared intention becomes a functioning communications capability will require decisions about the network, its deployment and who operates each part. The point of this agreement is to pursue those decisions with Ukraine’s Defence Ministry at the table.
Why Nokia Defense Is Here
Mikko Hautala, Nokia Defense’s chairman and its chief geopolitical and government relations officer, frames the need in blunt operational terms: when ground networks are disrupted, satellite networks can keep connectivity available. For a country fighting Russia’s full-scale war, dependable communications are a concrete wartime necessity. Forces and institutions need links they can rely on when infrastructure comes under attack.
Nokia brings communications infrastructure expertise to a partnership ICEYE approaches from space. Together, they are proposing an emergency backup service. Their stated model gives a government control across the system, from orbit to the terminal in a user’s hands. Having authority over the route itself is the difference from having another route for a connection.
A sovereign system would not make every existing service unnecessary. It would give Kyiv more control over a capability it cannot afford to lose.
The Dependence Question
Ukraine has good reason to build options beyond any single outside provider. Starlink has been vital to Ukrainian connectivity, but dependence on an externally controlled network leaves decisions about an essential wartime service in someone else’s hands. A sovereign system would not make every existing service unnecessary. It would give Kyiv more control over a capability it cannot afford to lose.
Nor should a Letter of Intent be mistaken for a delivered alternative to Starlink. ICEYE, Nokia and the Defence Ministry have agreed to explore cooperation, particularly on satellite communications. The companies’ broader LEO partnership sets out the technology and ownership model; the work of making it available to Ukraine lies ahead.
That distinction matters because Russia does not wait for a programme to mature before attacking the infrastructure Ukraine uses now. The case for sovereign communications is urgent precisely because building them takes work. Ukraine needs resilient links during disruption, and it needs the authority to run those links according to its own defence requirements.
The Finnish Prime Minister’s visit brought a concrete next step: Ukraine’s Defence Ministry, ICEYE and Nokia have put that ambition into a formal Letter of Intent. ICEYE brings its Ukraine record since 2022 and its space-mission experience. Nokia brings the communications side. Their joint European LEO project offers a model in which the state, not merely a service provider, controls the satellites, ground segment and terminals. Now that model has to be developed into something Ukraine can use.