Virgin Joining Race To Accessible Internet With “Most Satellites Ever”

Virgin is joining the race to provide internet access everywhere by “creating the world’s largest satellite constellation”. Joining the ranks of Facebook with its internet.org and Google with its Project Loon, Virgin aims to provide high speed internet to “billions”.

Virgin founder Richard Branson said in a blog post that the company will be utilising “Virgin Galactic’s LauncherOne programme” to make satellite launches cheaper and easier than ever.

“Delighted to share news of an incredibly exciting project that could transform the world: we are creating a new constellation of satellites to make high speed internet and telephony available to billions of people who don’t currently have access.” 

Together with Qualcomm, Virgin has formed OneWeb Ltd, a company that will utilise the technology and infrastructure built for Virgin Galactic to get so many satellites into space. They say that the initiative will eventually provide internet access to three billion people who could not access it before.

This project is one of a number of global internet initiatives, like Facebook’s internet.org mobile internet project and Google’s Project Loon, which aims to provide remote internet access via giant weather balloons. Microsoft also pitched in recently with its plan to use TV spectrum in India.

Source: Virgin