Amazon aims to branch into UK internet market with satellite broadband plan
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Proposed space launches within next two years could ultimately deliver mobile phone signal even to most remote areas. Amazon is hoping to offer a satellite broadband service in the UK within the next two years as it prepares to launch a constellation of spacecraft that could ultimately deliver a mobile signal even to the most remote areas.
The tech company, founded by Jeff Bezos, said it would seek access to British radio frequencies “over the next one to two years” as it prepares to offer satellite internet, according to a regulatory filing first reported by the Sunday Telegraph. Companies are racing to build and launch their own clusters of satellites into low-Earth orbit. If a single system launches enough of the smaller satellites less than 1,000km (620 miles) from Earth’s surface it can offer continuous coverage, without the time delays that are unavoidable for geostationary satellites 35,000km away.
Amazon’s Project Kuiper subsidiary is planning to launch 3,000 small satellites in an attempt to compete directly with Starlink, the satellite internet subsidiary of billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Starlink already allows users to connect to its low-Earth orbit satellites via small terminals, and it has a commanding lead in the sector with 6,000 satellites already in space. The company has 4 million customers around the world, and its terminals have been used heavily in the war in Ukraine.
