The Federal Communications Commission gave Amazon go-ahead on Thursday for its ambitious Kuiper project, which would put 3,236 broadband satellites in orbit to transmit Internet coverage down to earth. With this regulatory milestone assured, Amazon posed to join SpaceX in the race to be the world’s first billionaire tech giant to gobble up the space internet market.
“We conclude that granting the Kuiper application would increase the public interest by authorizing a system designed to increase the availability of high-speed broadband service to consumers, the government and businesses,” said FCC Secretary Marlene Dortch. in agency authorization order.
Amazon says it will launch its constellation of low Earth orbit satellites in five phases, with broadband service available once it has 578 satellites in orbit, according to the document. In your initial FCC filing, Amazon claimed that a Dear 3.8 billion people worldwide does not have reliable broadband internet access, a problem that has been brought in great relief as students from underserved communities struggles to attend virtual classes in the midst of the covid-19 pandemic. By the presentation, tThe Kuiper system will use Ka-band frequencies to provide “fixed broadband communications services to rural and hard-to-reach areas”, as well as “High-performance mobile broadband connectivity services for aircraft, marine vessels, and land vehicles.”
in a company blog post Regarding the FCC approval, Amazon said it plans to invest more than $ 10 billion. in Draft Kuiper to create jobs, increase satellite testing and manufacturing, and establish other necessary infrastructure.
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“We’ve heard a lot of stories lately about people who can’t do their jobs or complete school work because they don’t have reliable Internet at home,” said Amazon’s senior vice president. Dave Limp in a statement. “There are still too many places where broadband access is unreliable or where it doesn’t exist at all. Kuiper will change that. Our $ 10 billion investment will create jobs and infrastructure in the United States that will help us close this gap. ”
Keep their FCC license, Amazon should launch half of its 3,236 satellites by 2026 and the rest of the constellation by 2029, authorization states of order Another important stipulation requires Amazon to finalize its design plans for satellites. and, more importantly, how the company plans to mitigate their contributions to the growing cosmic junkyard that’s the low orbit of Earth. the FCC notes that Amazon failed “present specific information on some necessary elements of a waste mitigation plan“In your file, although the company stated that it plans to deorbit satellites within 355 days, which would be nice inside NASA standards if true.
In 2018, the FCC OK a Similar satellite constellation proposed by SpaceX known as Starlink. The company plans to send nearly 12,000 satellites into low Earth orbit and after launch mets first 60 satellites back in May hundreds more have followed.
The FCC did not mention possible launch dates for the deployment of the Kuiper Project, or which rockets will put Amazon’s satellites into orbit. Not by chance Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos also owns the aerospace firm Blue Origin, whose New Glenn orbital The rocket is ready for its debut launch in 2021. Given the potential conflict of interest, Blue Origin is likely will be among several competitors be Amazon’s launch provider.
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