Which I'll touch later. Government solution, enterprise solution, and some consumer solutions. I must say that the consumer is not our focus. We do it only if we need to. The company was established almost 40 years ago. We're traded on NASDAQ and in Tel Aviv. It's a global company. We have a global presence with 16 sales offices, seven R&D centers. The main ones are in Israel, here in California, in Bulgaria, and in Moldova. We have three NOCs, Network Operating Centers, in Moldova, in Peru, and in Australia, and we have 1,200 employees. Next two slides, we'll discuss the customer base and the value chain to focus you where we are at. So we have four main groups of customers in our portfolio. The first one is satellite operators. These are the owners of the satellites. Companies like SES, Intelsat, JSAT, Hispasat, these are the first group.
The second group would be the service providers and MNOs. You can see them on the map with some known names like T-Mobile here in the U.S. We have a very strong presence in Japan with SoftBank, Docomo, Rakuten, KDDI, Nelco in India, TIM in Brazil, and many others. The third group would be system integrators. These are large integrators that use our solution as part of a bigger one. Companies like Boeing, General Dynamics, Honeywell, Airbus, and so on. The fourth group would be governments. It could be either governments that subsidize connectivity, like in Peru, or it could be defense solutions. We operate in more than 100 countries. We have more than 300 customers and hundreds of networks, which is a lot in our business. In terms of value chain, on one hand, we have the satellite manufacturers. They would manufacture a satellite for the operator.
These were the first group of our customers. These are the most pivotal players in our market. Satellite operators are selling the capacity of the satellite to the service provider that provides its services to the end user. So if, for instance, I'm an ISP, I would buy the capacity from the satellite operator and sell it to a bank, to an oil and gas company, to an airline company, and so on. We're here in the middle. We provide our equipment to the satellite operator or to the service provider, as I explained before. Usually, the platform, the big large equipment, the hubs, would be provided to the satellite operators, and the end user terminals would be provided to the service providers, but it could work in other ways as well, so this is to put you in the general context of who we are and what we do.
We're focused on three main growth areas. The first is VHTS and NGSO constellations. VHTS stands for Very High Throughput Satellites, and NGSO is Non-Geostationary Orbits, and here we see a trend of abundance of capacity. I'll touch it in a few slides, and we see that all of the verticals like IFC, maritime, cellular backhaul are growing very rapidly. The second area of focus is the defense. Defense has been in our focus in the last few years. We just completed an acquisition at the end of 2023, and we see a lot of potential here as well, and the third area is Peru. In Peru, we have a recurring revenue model for services that we provide in the country. Most of them are terrestrial-related services. Let's start with number one, so VHTS and NGSO.
We see two mega trends in the last few years in the satellite industry that push the whole industry up. The first one is the abundance of capacity. I'm not going to give a lecture about satellites, but 20, 30 years ago, satellites used to have one large beam. They used to be in the geostationary orbit, very high. Most of it would spill to the ocean, and utilization was not that great. In the last years, this one beam became dozens of beams and hundreds of beams. So the monetization of each dollar that is invested in a satellite is much higher. This is one trend. The second trend is related to the launching cost, which decreased dramatically, dramatically. I mean 90% less than there used to be if you count them per kilo, and they're going to go down even further.
So the whole use case of satellite connectivity is getting much larger. And you can see it here in the addressable market that we see, which goes from $2 billion-$4 billion in the next few years. And it's very important to understand that for Gilat, the equation is pretty simple. The more data transferred through our solutions, the more revenues we have. So the more satellite users there are, the more revenues we have. We were operating for many years in the GEO business. This is where most of the satellites and business are today, with companies like SES, Intelsat. The important thing about GEO is that satellites are fixed above Earth. The antenna doesn't have to move, but the disadvantage is latency. In the last years, we see the MEO and LEO.
In the MEO, there is currently one constellation of SES, where Gilat is the sole provider of ground equipment for. This is a deal of tens of millions, even more than that. In the LEO, which is the hottest thing today, currently there are two constellations of OneWeb and Starlink. Starlink is a closed garden for OneWeb. We provide power amplifiers. There is now a second-generation bid, a very large one. This is the biggest part of our pipeline today, with potential of hundreds of millions of dollars. We're down-selected to be one of the last two bidders here, and we expect to get results very soon. IRIS² is the European constellation, another very large opportunity. This will take a little bit more time because it has many stakeholders and some political issues, but we believe that Gilat has a very, very strong position here as well.
Telesat just finished financing, and we're in discussions and the last name, which we cannot name, we're also working with and providing power amplifiers for, so I think that we're very well positioned in all three orbits. We provide our services with a platform called SkyEdge IV. SkyEdge IV was launched in 2022. It's the most advanced platform today in the market, and it was designed in order to provide services for multi-orbit constellation and for high-capacity satellites, and you can see it's a satellite operator's choice. SES, Hispasat, Intelsat, and others use this. More than $100 million of revenues so far from this platform. Let's go deeper to the verticals, and I want to start with the in-flight connectivity vertical, which is today the main catalyst for growth for Gilat, both organic and with the acquisition that we just made.
I guess that some of you came over in a flight, just a quick poll. How many had internet connectivity? I can say that the chances that there was some Gilat equipment on the plane is about 50%, just to give you a sense. We provide modems, aero modems for Intelsat. Intelsat has today 32 airlines that they serve. We provide the ground equipment, the SkyEdge IV, the main service. We provide transceivers, mainly to Honeywell and to others as well. And lately, we started to develop and provide aero antennas. We provide aero antennas to Satcom Direct, in which we engaged last year in a $30 million deal to develop and provide ESA, electronically steerable antennas for business jets. And we just acquired a company called Stellar Blu. Stellar Blu developed and now starts to deliver ESA, electronically steerable antenna, for commercial jets.
A few words about the acquisition: 60 employees. Main locations are here in the U.S., San Diego, and Dallas. I'll show you the antenna in the next slide, but it's a multi-orbit Satcom terminal. Main customer: Intelsat, Panasonic, Eutelsat, and Boeing. These are the big names in the industry, with a backlog of about $200 million that was already booked and about to be delivered within the next 18 months. And there is a lot of upside. The company currently works under Ku-band, and there is a lot of upside, another similar market for the Ka-band market for government users, land mobility, and so on. This is how the antenna looks. You can see that it's a very low profile, no radome, so very low maintenance cost. It operates with all orbits, LEO, GEO, and MEO, and it's agnostic to the service provider.
This is why the airlines like it. They're not captured with one service provider. And it has low maintenance costs and low drag and low fuel consumption associated with it. This is why the airlines like it. A few words about the deal. So it's initial cash of $98 million and another $147 million for earnout. Earnout is associated with the ability to deliver in the next year, with the ability to provide new backlog, more or less in the amount that we have today, within the next 18 months. And the last $100 million are associated with providing strategic deals. Strategic deals are deals that unlock the large markets that I discussed before. Gilat has today more than $100 million of cash, no debt. So we're going to finance most of the deal from own resources and some from financing that we already closed.
We expect to close by the end of November, depending on CFIUS's approvals. 2025 expected revenues from Stellar Blu are about $120-$150 million. So this is going to be a big lift to Gilat and take us from the 300 area to the 450 area. And it's going to be profitable during the second half of 2025, with more than 10% EBITDA margins that can even go further. Second vertical is the maritime. Maritime is relatively new to Gilat. We're not a large player, but there is a lot of room to grow. This is a $50-$70 million market, about to double itself in the next few years. And the third one is the Cellular Backhaul. In the Cellular Backhaul, Gilat dominates this market with more than 75% market share in the 4G, 40% in the overall market.
You can see some speed tests that we did with SES, MEO constellations in India. The download and upload are just like terrestrial mobile. So the experience is seamless. And the market is growing from the area of $150 to the area of $500 million with the 5G, which will, of course, drive us as well. I discussed the customer. This is a very, very important market for Gilat as well. So this was focus area number one. The second focus area is the defense and government market. Gilat has been a relatively small player in this market until recently. And in order to fulfill our strategy, we decided to look for an acquisition in the US. So before that, we had all the in-house capability. We had the portfolio of products and solutions, but it was very hard for us to penetrate into the US market.
Just to give you some sense, the US market is about $1 billion a year, so it's very big. And it's a very sticky market. Once you go on a program, it could take you for 10-15 years. We acquired DataPath last year. In November last year, we closed the deal. Company provides about $45 million of revenues, even a bit more than that. EBITDA positive. We did the deal in a few phases. First one is $18 million of down payment. Most of it was by assuming debt. And the rest, $27 million, are earnouts based on future results. You can see some pictures of the products of DataPath, mainly for Comms-on-the-Pause. You go in the field, you stop, and then you have some hubs on trucks, or these are other hubs. There is equipment that the soldier can take on his back.
You also provide services like network management solutions and so on, field services, and so on. Third area is Peru. In Peru, we have a little bit different business. Gilat has been operating in Peru for the last 25 years, providing the beginning satellite-based solutions. In 2015, the government of Peru started a program of connecting rural areas. We won six areas out of 24, which we operate today in a $550 million total amount of projects. Out of it, $350 million for the construction and the rest for operation for 10 years. On top of that, we provide other services in Peru. Currently, we're in annual recurring revenues of about $50 million in Peru, with EBITDA margins of about 15%. There is a lot of room to grow over there as well. A few words about the numbers.
So we grow over the years, quarter over quarter, and year over year. I think that this would be a better view, about 20% growth in revenues year over year, both organic and inorganic. Gross margins decreased a bit. Usually, it's a matter of mix. But here, since we acquired DataPath, the defense market is associated with a bit less lower gross margins, but provides nice EBITDAs. So we grew in the EBITDA as well. We have a very strong balance sheet, almost no debt. That is really marginal, $2-$3 million. In the last quarter, we had a small decrease in cash, shifted into Q3. So now we're above $100 million. Company is very strong, very healthy DSO, also almost no bad debt for Gilat. And as I said, we provide cash from operations on an ongoing basis.
On top of that, Gilat has some real estate assets that were acquired 20 plus years ago, valued at about $100 million. In the books, it's about $50 million. So this is another asset that we have, no debt, of course. In terms of guidance, so you can see the revenue is constantly growing from $240-$266 to anywhere between $305-$325 million this year. Operating profit is decreasing because of PPA accounting for the acquisition of DataPath. So this is non-cash, I would say, cosmetics. And the adjusted EBITDA, again, constantly growing from $25-$36 to $40-$42. And as I said, we expect Stellar Blu to close very soon and to lift both revenues and EBITDA even further. We also provided the market guidance by segments. You can see that all segments are growing this year.
The one that grows the most is the satellite networks, and to sum up, I think that Gilat is in a perfect position to continue growing. We have a market which grows both the VHTS and NGSO, opening new markets for us. I think that we have the right platform, which is very unique in the market, the SkyEdge IV, and we're focused on the IFC, cellular backhaul, defense, which are very sticky and growing markets. The last point is very important as well. We're very focused on growth, but it has to be profitable, I mean, not in any price. This is something that has always been in our DNA, and it's very important to us. That's it. I'll be happy to take questions.
With the other acquisitions, which are you considering at this time? What's your strategy for?
So currently, we're focused on the Stellar Blu. It's quite a big acquisition for us. But we're also looking at other opportunities. There are not so many. We're looking for opportunities, first of all, in terms of size. It has to be material. We're not looking for too small acquisitions. So, it has to provide enough revenues in order to make a difference. We're looking for areas that will be adjacent or with high synergies to our business. I can say that we look at probably 10 to 20 companies every year. Half of them are not relevant. And with the rest, we go deeper. And then it has to be good business and a good deal because there are a lot of good businesses, but most of them are super expensive. So, we need a fit.
We're looking also for businesses that we feel comfortable with management and with the ability to combine with us and work together.
Where are you headquartered?
Sorry?
Where are you headquartered?
In Israel. Headquarters is in Israel. We also have here in the US very strong presence. We have a Wavestream here in San Dimas, near LA. We have DataPath in Atlanta, and we have Stellar Blu in San Diego. So a lot of, I would say, focus moves to the US. We spend a lot of time here. Yeah.
Can you comment in general on Starlink? How they fit in as either a potential customer or competitor, whether it's in the area or?
Yeah. First of all, they're doing a great job, and they really made a change to the whole market.
I could say that their main position, from our perspective, is a competitor to our customers. So at the end of the day, it also affects us. It's a closed garden. There might be some opportunities to work together. I think that the biggest opportunity might be on the ESA antenna for the IFC market, although they try to develop it by themselves. But there might be an opportunity to cooperate here. Not that likely, I must say. They're a strong player. They push the market. And each one takes his share of the pie. Other questions?
I assume they have a low multiple, both earnings-wise and price sales.
Yeah. This is usually a question that I ask you.
We've got enough time for about one.
Yeah, yeah. Just let me answer. I think that probably we're affected a bit by the Stellar Blu acquisition. I think that the market doesn't really appreciate the whole potential for Gilat. Once numbers will hit in, I believe that we'll enjoy that and that the share will react a s well.
We are officially out of time.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.