As Google and Fidelity invest $1 billion in the SpaceX founder's new venture, your Skype calls and online gaming may soon be hassle free and bring remote areas under the Internet connectivity umbrella.
Space super entrepreneur, Elon Musk, the one of Tesla Motors, SpaceX and Hyperloop, is aiming for a mammoth project now. This project will make your Skyping and video gaming hassle free and it will also bring remote areas of Earth under the Internet connectivity umbrella.
Musk wants to create a constellation of 4000 lightweight satellites orbiting closer to the surface of earth. These satellites will bounce data faster than what is done through fibre optic cables. They will also make Internet access an easily available service in remote areas, giving access to more than 3 billion under-served people. The project will eliminate the need of fibre optic cables and thus the need to maintain them.
Musk wants to create a global communication system larger than anything that has been talked about till date. This fleet of satellites will orbit Earth at an altitude of about 22000 km, 30 times closer to the surface than the geostationary satellites of today. They'll travel at 16000 mph and orbit the Earth within two hours, else they face the risk of crashing out of sky.
Data will go to space and be bounced from satellite to satellite until they reach the nearest destination and then return to the antenna on earth. If you consider the fact that light travels 40% faster in vacuum, imagine the speed these data packages will achieve!
The idea, except for the architecture, is similar to that of OneWeb, founded by ex-Google satellite chief Greg Wyler. Wyler has the backing of Virgin and Qualcomm to create their own constellation of 648 satellites whereas Musk's venture is backed by Fidelity and Google.
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) has raised a billion dollars in a financing round with two new investors, Google and Fidelity. They join existing investors Founders Fund, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Valor Equity Partners and Capricorn. Google and Fidelity will collectively own just under 10% of the company, SpaceX said in a statement on January 20.
Google also has its own project, 'Project Loon'. Helium-filled balloons surf the stratospheric (some 70 km above Earth's surface) winds. These balloons are connected to each other through mesh networking. A mesh network topology is a decentralised design in which each node on the network connects to at least two other nodes. Mesh networks are expected to play an important part in the Internet of Things (IoT)] techniques. They use radio broadband links to connect to the ground. Data floats balloon to balloon until it's within the site of a ground receiver and then they offload data into the regular Internet we use.
The main challenge with Musk's project will be the repairs and maintenance of the satellites. These technologies freeze over time and updating will not be easy given that sending astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) is still a challenge.
Combined with Loon Balloons, Musk's constellation and a dense network of stationary transmitters on Earth may well bring the world closer than ever before!
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