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| Starlink could offer global coverage in September |
Gwen Shotwell, president of SpaceX, said Elon Musk's Starlink satellite internet business is expected to provide continuous global coverage through September, after which time it will need to obtain regulatory approval.
Shotwell's comments were streamed online while attending a Macquarie Group technical meeting.
"We have successfully deployed about 1,800 satellites," she said. Once all of these satellites are in orbit, we will have continuous global coverage. So it should be similar to the September plan. But then we have a regulatory task that has to go to each country and get approval to provide telecom services.
Shotwell said Starlink has announced plans to deploy a total of 12,000 satellites at a cost of nearly $10 billion and is currently offering pilot services in 11 countries/regions.
Musk said in May that the satellite network had received more than 500,000 pre-orders for internet services and that there would be no technical problems to meet the demand.
That year, the US Federal Communications Commission approved SpaceX's plan to deploy certain Starlink satellites into lower-Earth orbits than expected. It is about providing high speed internet services to people who cannot currently access it.
Starlink Global Coverage:
Starlink is one of the growing manufacturers of small satellites. Including Kuiper from Amazon, OneWeb and Blue Canyon from Great Britain.
At the same time, SpaceX has filed regulatory documents that require at least six Starlink satellite launches from East Coast facilities.
This means that SpaceX will continue to work on revitalizing the company's only launch pad on the West Coast.
Last month, Starlink took an important step forward with the successful launch of its 28th satellite by SpaceX. This effectively completed the installation of the first batch of 1,600 satellites.
Technically, about 1,100 of these satellites are operational. 530 of these other satellites are still being processed. This is to raise you to the final path.
Once all the orbiting satellites are done, this process. The Starlink constellation can provide uninterrupted Internet access to almost all people on Earth.