According to the Wall Street Journal, Google is preparing a fleet of about 180 satellites to space that will deliver internet access to “the other 3 billion”. That is those without internet access, especially remote areas in developing countries.
According to the report, the project is lead by Greg Wyler, founder of O3b Networks, a satellite internet provider company. Apparently ‘O3b’ stands for “other 3 billion”, which gives more credence to the possibiltiy of this project being a reality.
The satellites are to be launched into low orbit and will cost Google between $1 billion and $3 billion. There is no given time frame for the completion of the project. But for what it’s worth, the O3b webiste states that their next satellites will be launched in July. No specific connection is made with the Google project.
While it’s all still speculation for now, it is not unlikely to be true, as Google has taken on similar projects in the past. Google Fibre is a 1GB/s broadband infrastructure serving select cities in the US and Project Loon is Google’s ambitious balloon internet network, piloted in New Zealand.
Should the speculations be confirmed, this will be Google’s hugest and most widepsread internet project yet.
Source: WSJ via Android Police
Photo Credit: Darwin Bell via Compfight cc
