Who are the main sat phone players in the boat business?
For Europe + Mid East, Thuraya works OK and is far cheaper than anybody else. Their GPRS is £5/MB which is half of what Voda UK charge me when roaming
Some of their Thuraya-Thuraya voice call rates are incredible, ~ 20p/minute.
But their customer service is dreadful - no suprise the "professional" users all seem to be using Iridium who even sell ready to use "aviation" packages.
Globalstar lost a lot of functionality (according to resellers) due to lack of investment, and that leaves Immarsat who do a lot of slick products but are pricey.
I did a lot of research into this last year, and decided Thuraya is the one to play with. But if I was reselling a product/service which I had to support, I would go with Iridium and to hell with what it costs the customer
No satcomms deal is truly cheap. For example all of them run the "confiscation of unused prepayment" scam where your entire outstanding PAYG balance is forfeited after X months. Thuraya is the least bad, grabbing your $160 after 12 months.