Elon Musk’s Starlink system is made up of thousands of small satellites orbiting the Earth at an altitude of about 340 miles. Starlink is providing internet service to around 40 countries since coming online in 2021.
Elon Musk is considered by some as a controversial visionary or an opportunistic marketeer with a gift for creating projects that attract investment like bees to the honey.
Starlink has the potential to be massive disrupter among existing SATCOM networks with consistent download speeds of 150 to 200 mbps, compared to the maximum 80 mbps with Viasat. Starlink is also estimated to be $5,000 cheaper per month compared to $10,000. for GEO networks such as Viasat
More than 2,500 active satellites now orbit the Earth, with more coming on stream every month. Satellite communications were initially geosynchronous (GEO) spacecraft—large systems with huge data capacity. But now nongeosynchronous-orbit (NGSO) communications constellations, including low-Earth-orbit (LEO) and medium-Earth-orbit (MEO) satellites, are becoming the norm. It is estimated that 50,000 active satellites will orbit overhead within ten years.
The new LEO-satellite concepts that orbit 500 to 2,000 kilometers from Earth provide higher bandwidth per user than GEO satellites. Communication occurs through a network of LEO satellites. Global coverage requires a large number of spacecraft. This new generation of connectivity requires major changes in satellite operations, from the manufacturing and the supply chain to the delivery into location, The average life span of a LEO satellite is estimated to be about five years with Starlink, the SpaceX constellation.
Consequently, investment has to be recouped in a shorter time span than a GEO system. Starlink, with its futuristic appeal and star appeal with Elon Musk at the helm has made the most clamour and has been successful in attracting investment in the SpaceX project. But Starlink, like Tesla and Twitter, has competitors.
Start ups with better business models are increasingly receiving funding from tech companies. Telesat has proposed a network of 117 spacecraft and the potential to deploy more than 500. Amazon has filed to launch 3,236 spacecraft in its Kuiper constellation.
It’s going to be a bear fight up there, above our heads as we gaze into the night sky as Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, the two titans in the public imagination, slug it out with their constellations. Who will be Ursa Major and who will be Ursa Minor?
