Two ‘space dreamers’ and alumni of the Indian Institute of Science have conjured up a space network of 150 small, Internet-friendly high-throughput satellites almost covering the globe by 2020.
The spacecraft will beam down bandwidth from 1,000 km in space for Internet — anytime and whether you are on a hilltop, in a village or a remote place.
Astrome Technologies, their small startup in Bengaluru, is racing to ready communication technologies that will drive this Internet dream.
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“The Indian Internet market is growing at 30 per cent CAGR (compounded annual growth rate). However, net enabled from Space is almost negligible, especially for common users. It is mostly a luxury item for businesses and in-flight connectivity. But that picture is changing because the cost of its infrastructure has fallen drastically in the last two decades. It also makes our case viable,” says Prasad H.L. Bhat, co-founder, Chairman and Chief Technology Officer of Astrome. Which is also why globally larger players with deeper pockets are getting into a similar gameplan — among them cellular major Bharti Enterprises joining the multi-partner OneWeb. OneWeb talks about launching 650-900 satellites offering Internet services from Space by 2019.
If you want to use Internet beamed down from Space, Dr. Bhat says all you need to do is install an antenna on the rooftop, wherever you are. No more depending on the infrastructure (fibre optic cable) coming to you. The present net-enabling underground cables will co-exist.
“Low data users in semi-urban and rural areas do not get good bandwidth. This market can be addressed from space,” says Dr. Bhat, who started the company last year with Neha Satak.
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“We are targeting this segment. We are taking baby steps, first developing core communication technologies that can give 100 gbps per satellite [versus the current 8-10 gbps per satellite].” This is to be achieved by June next year.
From 2018, Astrome plans to make the satellites, each of 100-200-kg mass, at the facilities of various established partners and launch them in batches of 10 on Indian PSLV or other innovative low-cost launch companies like SpaceX or Blue Origin. It will also rope in companies that have ground-based hub stations and use their stations rather than set them up itself - to keep the cost low.
Investors are interested, Dr. Bhat said, without sharing the likely cost of their project.