OneWeb satellites One step away from providing space-based Internet services all over the world

OneWeb, backed by Bharti Enterprise, is one step away from deploying more than 600 low-Earth orbit satellites, paving the way for broadband Internet services from space to all over the world.

Backed by the British government, Bharti Enterprises, Eutelsat, SoftBank, Hughes Networks and Hanwha, OneWeb has launched Internet of Space services in more than 50 countries at north latitude – Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Great Britain and Northern Europe.

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) launch vehicle Mark-3 (LVM3) will launch 36 OneWeb satellites from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota on March 26. 582 satellites.

“We are one launch away from achieving global coverage. This latest launch by ISRO/NSIL marks more than 600 satellites in space, which is the number required for commercial use,” a OneWeb spokesperson told PTI.

NewsSpace India Limited (NSIL) is the commercial arm of ISRO, which is also tasked with procuring industrially built rockets and satellites for the delivery of space services.

Weather permitting, ISRO’s LVM3 is scheduled to place 36 OneWeb satellites into low Earth orbit on March 26. This is the second time OneWeb is using ISRO’s satellite launch services. The first batch of 36 OneWeb satellites was launched from Sriharikota on October 23 last year.

The upcoming release on ISRO’s LVM3 is the 18th release of OneWeb. SpaceX’s Falcon-9 rocket placed 40 OneWeb satellites into orbit on March 9.

“This year we plan to launch services around the world,” the spokesperson said.

OneWeb plans to launch services in India later this year, subject to regulatory approvals, and has already obtained a GMPCS (global mobile personal communications by satellite services) license from the Ministry of Telecommunications and a nod to establish a ground station. “Other clearances are required from the space ministry. We will have clarity on that when the space policy comes out,” Lt Gen A K Bhatt (retd), director general of the Indian Space Association (ISpA), the space sector body, told PTI.

Lt Gen Bhatt said the space policy was in the final stages of approval and was expected to be announced sometime this year.

“We are confident of launching our services later this year in India and have announced distribution agreements with Hughes to provide services,” a OneWeb spokesperson said.

Clearances earlier issued by ISRO to private companies must now be routed through the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Center (INSPACe), a single-window nodal agency for the private sector.

OneWeb is a wholesale provider of Internet services via satellite, unlike the Starlink service that Elon Musk’s SpaceX offers directly to individual users.

“We offer our network services to telecommunications companies, Internet service providers, companies and governments for the use of fast, low-latency service,” the spokesperson stated.

OneWeb had approached ISRO for the launch of 72 satellites, said to have cost Rs 1,000 crore, after it was forced to abandon arrangements with Russia’s Soyuz rockets following the conflict in Ukraine.

OneWeb uses satellites placed 36,000 kilometers above the equator in geostationary orbits (GEO) that provide broadband Internet access to provide a constellation of LEO satellites.

According to a report by GSMA Intelligence, LEO satellites placed in orbit 200 to 1,500 km from Earth – compared to 36,000 km for GEO satellites – significantly increase bandwidth and reduce latency in space to around 50 to 70 milliseconds (ms). industry body, said. Latency refers to the time it takes for a data packet to be sent from the user to the Internet service provider via the satellite network. The latency of GEO satellite networks is in the range of 500-700 ms, which limits their use to 2G and 3G communication.

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