According to an application filed with the FCC on May 29, California-based space company SpaceX is planning to launch a network of satellites that will beam down Internet access to regions with little or no connection to the web. The initial program’s main objective “is to validate the design of a broadband antenna communications platform that will lead to the final LEO [low-Earth orbit] constellation design,” SpaceX said in its FCC filings.
The application describes two prototype satellites, dubbed MicroSat-1a and MicroSat-1b, which are likely to be built using the $1 billion donation that SpaceX received from Google and Fidelity in January. SpaceX said in its filings that the prototype satellites are being designed to operate for six to 12 months; eventually six to eight prototypes would be deployed. SpaceX plans to test its satellite Internet service in 2016.
SpaceX says the satellites will fly in a circular 388-mile-high orbit and follow a nearly pole-to-pole course. The Ku-band satellite ground stations will be built on the premises of three of Musk’s facilities: SpaceX’s headquarters in Hawthorne, California; the company’s new office in Redmond, Washington; and the Fremont, California, headquarters of Tesla Motors.
The details laid out in the documents are in line with SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk’s plan to build and launch thousands of small telecom satellites for cheap and unregulated Internet access across the world. In January, Musk said that a “useful version one” of the project could be deployed in five years, with the second- and third-generation system rolled out over five-year intervals.
actually google had a simmilar idea 1 or 2 years ago but it would be too expensive to do this so what’s the difference between google’s ideea and this one?
Elon Musk is not greedy bastard, he really thinks what he has to offer to humanity for a reasonable cost. This is slow way of getting popular but hey the guy is gentle genius and I’m sure he will get support eventually.