Internet via low orbit satellites gains space – 06/25/2023 – Tech

In March, a teleport for satellites was inaugurated in Maricá (151 km from Rio de Janeiro), by the company Telespazio Brasil. The infrastructure hosts the base of low orbit satellites of the British OneWeb, which should increase competition in the country.

The gateway (ground station) is part of OneWeb’s Latin American system, to provide a broadband experience with low latency, high security communications for government institutions, defense industries, oil and gas and aviation.

“The completion of our constellation and global coverage this year is a significant milestone for our business and for Brazil,” a company representative said at the time.

OneWeb uses technology similar to that of Starlink, the arm of Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which also operates with OTB satellites. These providers are considered ideal options for hard-to-reach regions.

At OTB, the satellites are at an altitude of between 500 and 1,500 km above the Earth, according to Abrasat (Brazilian Association of Satellite Telecommunications Companies). Satellites are non-stationary with respect to Earth and have an average lifetime of 7 to 10 years.

But, unlike Starlink, OneWeb’s service will not be offered directly to the consumer. The strategy will be to sell capacity to cell phone companies and other services that, in turn, will use it to expand and improve their networks, as anticipated by the company.

“Unlike other providers that sell directly to consumers, we work with local partners such as telecoms and internet service providers and local governments who are best placed to deliver high-speed, low-latency OneWeb connectivity to the local market .”

Latency is the minimum response time between a device and internet servers — it’s important for activities that demand precision, but not so much for everyday actions.

In July 2022, Anatel (National Telecommunications Agency) authorized the OneWeb OTB (Low Earth Orbit) satellite constellation to be operated in Brazil for a period of 15 years. The company has until July 2024 to get its system up and running.

The company said it expects to provide services to thousands of businesses in the country. “This license will also allow OneWeb to support the efforts of the Brazilian government to extend the digital infrastructure across the country”, signaled the operator, a year ago.

The company anticipates that coverage will be available for south-central Brazil by the end of the third quarter.

According to the president of Anatel, Carlos Baigorri, the agency was informed of the licensing of systems and stations and the company’s entry will be a gain for the national market.

“Especially in regions without access to fiber optic networks, satellite is unbeatable. For us, the greater the offer, the better.”

With the satellite constellation completed, plus the gateways in Brazil —there is another gateway expected to be installed in Petrolina (PE) by the end of 2023— and regulatory approvals from Anatel, the service offer should increase soon.

SATELLITE CONSTELLATIONS SPREAD OUT

When high-speed internet access began to spread via OTB satellite constellations some eight years ago, analysts expected only two or three companies to succeed.

Currently, at least eight of them are competing to launch or complete their constellations, including early entrants SpaceX (owned by Elon Musk) and OneWeb. Amazon plans to launch more than 3,200 satellites as part of its Kuiper project.

According to the Financial Times, the need to gain scale to compete with rivals was one of the reasons OneWeb and French satellite group Eutelsat entered into a merger process last year.

According to the British newspaper, Starlink’s subscriber revenues, excluding sales of terminals, were around US$ 1 billion (R$ 4.8 billion) last year. In optimistic projections, revenue doubles every year. OneWeb forecasts revenues of €600 million (R$3.2 billion) by 2025.

Governments must also enter this race. China plans to launch 13,000 satellites across the GuoWang constellation, while German startup Rivada will place around 600.

This will be in addition to the European Union’s Iris project (170 satellites) and the 300 to 500 satellites the US Space Development Agency plans to launch.

While around 120 satellites were launched in all of 2012, in just the first two months of this year nearly 380 were put into orbit.

The total number of OTB satellites is expected to increase to around 24,500 over the next decade, according to forecasts by the specialist company Euroconsult.

OTB operator SpaceX has been authorized to deploy 7,500 of its 30,000 second-generation constellation.

OneWeb intends to complete its constellation of 650 satellites.

The head of Amazon’s Kuiper project, Dave Limp, plans to have more than half of his constellation ready by mid-2026.

With AFP