Richard Branson, Virgin's tycoon, is the main lender of an ambitious project to bring the Internet to the most remote areas of the planet. Broad bandwidth and reduced costs.
Branson is in fact, along with the Qualcomm telecommunications giant, the first lender of OneWeb, the company that will orbit the largest satellite network ever. How many? 648 for the first phase, 2,400 for the project finished. They will be brought to the cosmos from LauncherOne, the small spacecraft of Virgin Galactic owned by Branson. Unlike large conventional space rockets, LauncherOne has much lower operating costs, which will substantially contribute to the economic sustainability of the project.
From the practical point of view, the microsatellite will provide users with a direct connection to the Network in all those areas of the planet that are not covered by traditional operators due to the high costs and because they are considered unprofitable.
OneWeb devices will, in short, create cells that offer 3G, 4G, or Wi-Fi connectivity even in the most isolated mountains or in the middle of the desert. The project, estimated at about $ 2 billion, will enable education and information to be delivered to the more remote areas of the planet, but also to create jobs and growth opportunities for entire nations.
