Elon Musk Plans To Launch Test Satellite To Provide Epic Global Internet
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Depending on where you live, your download speeds are either lightning fast or resembling dial up internet from the late 1990s. In this day and age, where we have smartphones that are pretty lame without quick internet, it's pretty essential to have 4G.
Well, Elon Musk is hoping to end this battle to find a good connection.
His SpaceX program will be launching a rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, which will house two experimental satellites. It was scheduled to lift off yesterday, but that's been delayed until Wednesday, to allow the crew to perform some final checks.
Elon's vision, dubbed the Starlink, is a collection of 12,000 low-cost, high-performance satellite bus that will be orbiting Earth by the mid-2020s. If it's successful, it will provide global, high-speed internet around the world.
That's not too shabby.
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Documents filed to the FCC indicate that the way these satellites will advance our internet capabilities is through 'advanced phased array beam forming', 'innovative optical inter-satellite links' and 'digital processing technologies'.
"When combined into a single, coordinated system, these 'LEO' and 'VLEO' constellations will enable SpaceX to provide robust broadband services on a full and continuous global basis," the application says.
The head of the FCC, Ajit Pai, is backing the project, saying: "I have asked my colleagues to join me in supporting this application and moving to unleash the power of satellite constellations to provide high-speed internet to rural Americans.
"If adopted, it would be the first approval given to an American-based company to provide broadband services using a new generation of low-Earth orbit satellite technologies."
The Wall Street Journal obtained some private documents from SpaceX, which shows they're pretty confident about Starlink being a raging success.
"SpaceX projected the satellite-internet business would have over 40 million subscribers and bring in more than $30 billion in revenue by 2025," the dossier reportedly said.
Also onboard the Falcon 9's payload will be Spain's first radar imaging satellite, named the PAZ. According to Airbus, the golden machine will 'primarily to address civilian surveillance needs and to cover many different applications including defence and security'.
But Musk isn't the only one who's planning on sending out hundreds of satellites to help increase our communication capabilities.
OneWeb, which has invested support from Richard Branson, has applied to launch 1,280 satellites into medium Earth orbit in addition to the 2,700 planned to create a constellation.
Hopefully, increased competition between these players means one thing: decent internet everywhere on the planet.
Featured Image Credit: PA
Topics: elon musk, Internet, News, Interesting, SpaceX, Technology, space
