MENLO PARK, Calif., Oct. 5 (UPI) — Social networking giant Facebook announced Monday it is teaming up with a European satellite company to advance a global initiative intended to provide Internet access to remote corners of the Earth.
Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg outlined the company’s proposal to supply global satellite-based web access — as opposed to the terrestrial cable-based infrastructure — in a Facebook post Monday.
“I’m excited to announce our first project to deliver internet from space. As part of our Internet.org efforts to connect the world, we’re partnering with Eutelsat to launch a satellite into orbit that will connect millions of people,” Zuckerberg wrote.
The innovator’s Internet.org initiative, devised two years ago, seeks to grant worldwide online access as a basic “human right” — particularly to those in remote regions who are considered “off the grid.”
“To connect people living in remote regions, traditional connectivity infrastructure is often difficult and inefficient, so we need to invent new technologies,” he added. “Over the last year Facebook has been exploring ways to use aircraft and satellites to beam Internet access down into communities from the sky.”
Zuckerberg’s plan partners the social network with French communications company Eutelsat, which manufactures a new satellite that figures to be the centerpiece of Facebook’s design.
“We are excited by this opportunity to accelerate the deployment of our broadband strategy and to partner with Facebook,” Eutelsat CEO Michel de Rosen said. “Eutelsat’s strong track record in operating High Throughput Satellite systems will ensure that we can deliver accessible and robust Internet solutions that get more users online and part of the Information Society.”
The first place scheduled to reap the benefits of the project is Africa — which has, by far, the lowest Internet availability per capita of any place on Earth. Less than 20 percent of African citizens can get online, according to the International Telecommunications Union.
Asia and Pacific regions have the second-worst Internet availability, at 32 percent. Both regions would eventually see a rise in those figures under Facebook’s initiative.
“A new satellite called AMOS-6 is going to provide Internet coverage to large parts of Sub-Saharan Africa,” Zuckerberg said. “The AMOS-6 satellite is under construction now and will launch in 2016 into a geostationary orbit that will cover large parts of West, East and Southern Africa.”
“Under a multi-year agreement with Spacecom, the two companies will utilize the entire broadband payload on the future AMOS-6 satellite and will build a dedicated system comprising satellite capacity, gateways and terminals,” Eutelsat said in a news release Monday. “Eutelsat and Facebook will each deploy Internet services designed to relieve pent-up demand for connectivity from the many users in Africa beyond range of fixed and mobile terrestrial networks.”
“Connectivity changes lives and communities. We’re going to keep working to connect the entire world — even if that means looking beyond our planet,” Zuckerberg wrote.
