Anxiety has set in across the space industry ever since the world’s richest man, Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, revealed Project Kuiper: a plan to put 3,236 satellites in orbit to provide high-speed Internet around the globe.
Offering broadband Internet coverage to digital deserts is also the goal of the company OneWeb, which is set to start building two satellites a day this summer in Florida, for a constellation of more than 600 expected to be operational by 2021
Billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX is equally active: It has just received a clearance to put 12,000 satellites in orbit at various altitudes in the Starlink constellation. Not to mention other projects in the pipeline that have less funding or are not yet as defined.
Photo: AFP
Is there even enough space for three, four, five or more space-based Internet providers?
At the Satellite 2019 international conference in Washington this week, professionals from the sector said they feared an expensive bloodbath — especially if Bezos decides to crush the competition with ultra-low prices.
“Jeff Bezos is rich enough to put you out of business,” Iridium Communications chief executive officer Matt Desch said.
Iridium knows all about bankruptcy. The company launched a satellite phone in the 1990s — a brick-like set that cost US$3,000 with call rates of US$3 a minute. Barely anyone subscribed at the dawn of the mobile era.
The firm eventually relaunched itself and has just finished renewing its entire constellation: Sixty-six satellites offering connectivity, but not broadband, with 100 percent global coverage to institutional clients including ships, airplanes, militaries and businesses.
“The problem with satellites, it’s billions of dollars of investments,” Desch said.
If “you spend billions and you get it wrong, you end up creating sort of a nuclear winter for the whole industry for 10 years. We did that,” he said.
“These guys coming in, I wish them really well... I hope they don’t take 30 years to become successful like we did,” he added.
Having Internet beamed in from space is more of a priority for isolated zones than it is for cities, where users have fiber-optic or cable connections.
With satellite constellations, it does not matter where you are in the world — an antenna is all you need to get broadband.
“It’s just like having a very tall cell tower,” said Al Tadros of Maxar, which builds satellites.
The other advantage of the newly announced constellations are their relatively low orbit, which is important for reducing latency, key in curbing lag in video calls or games, for example.
Isolated areas might be where the technology is required, but there might not be enough customers to make the endeavor profitable. That is why OneWeb has lowered its sights and would first target providing Internet services to airplanes or to ships, where there is a huge demand.
“The challenge in monetizing is being able to get through those first few years, where you have to put in all your capital expenses, but not being able to get enough revenues to keep you afloat,” Northern Sky Research senior analyst Shagun Sachdeva told reporters.
Sachdeva expected most of the companies to die off, saying that the market would eventually have room for “maybe two” firms and that space-delivered Internet services would not be commonplace for at least five to 10 years.
Amazon is only just getting off the ground and faces the hurdle of acquiring rights to the frequency spectrum.
By arriving late, it is already behind the curve, said Michael Schwartz of operator Telesat, which is building its own constellation to be used by companies. “People don’t pay enough attention about the need for spectrum rights.”
However, Amazon’s many advantages are abundantly clear: The group has a formidable IT infrastructure on the ground that can support the satellite network.
Bezos finances his own rocket company, Blue Origin, which should be able to secure him a competitive price for the dozens of launches needed for the constellation.
These are factors that OneWeb chief financial officer Thomas Whayne acknowledged during a panel discussion on Monday.
“If they are serious, they will do it and will do it well,” he said.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was