http://money.cnn.com/2015/10/05/technology/facebook-africa-satellites/
Facebook to beam free internet to Africa with satellites
Facebook is one step closer to finally beaming Internet down from space.
The social network is teaming up with the French satellite company Eutelsat (ETCMY) to launch a satellite that will provide internet access to people in sub-Saharan Africa. The satellite will launch next year and service will start in the second half of 2016. It will reach 14 countries in West, East and Southern Africa.
Facebook (FB, Tech30) will use the satellite to bring free Internet access to rural areas. The company is using satellites, lasers and drones to get the "next billion" people around the world online as part of its Internet.org initiative. It has already connected people in nearly 20 countries.
"Facebook's mission is to connect the world and we believe that satellites will play an important role in addressing the significant barriers that exist in connecting the people of Africa," said Chris Daniels, VP of Internet.org, in a statement.
Facebook and Eutelsat are leasing the AMOS-6 satellite from Israeli company Spacecom. The two companies will share the satellite and use it for their own individual services. Eutelsat will expand its paid broadband connections in the region for businesses and well-off individuals.
Internet.org has been criticized for limiting what services people can access through the free smartphone app. It currently includes free access to 60 services, including health and finance tools and, of course, Facebook. The app was recently renamed "Free Basics by Facebook" in an attempt to distance it from other Internet.org projects. In May, Facebook launched an platform so third-party developers could develop their own services for Internet.org.
In July, Facebook unveiled a new custom drone it is building to bring internet to hard-to-reach and underserved locations. Other companies are also racing to bring low-cost, low-bandwidth Internet to the world. Google is working on Project Loon which uses hot air balloons.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/oct/05/facebook-mark-zuckerberg-internet-access-africa
Facebook to beam free internet to Africa with satellites
Facebook satellite to beam internet to remote regions in Africa
Mark Zuckerberg details plans on how company is ‘exploring ways to use aircraft and satellites to beam internet access down into communities from the sky’
Tuesday 6 October 2015 08.23 BST
Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg took to his own timeline on Monday to announce that the company would be providing web access … from space. A new satellite called Amos-6 will make the web accessible from big chunks of sub-Saharan Africa, orbiting over the continent and serving what Zuckerberg characterized as “large parts of west, east and southern Africa”.
“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 wrote. “To connect people living in remote regions, traditional connectivity infrastructure is often difficult and inefficient, so we need to invent new technologies.”
Zuckerberg did not say who would provide the receivers for the satellite signal – the web still has to connect to computers with cables and local Wi-Fi, after all – merely that Facebook was “going to work with local partners across these regions to help communities begin accessing internet services provided through satellite”. The initiative is undertaken in partnership with a charity Facebook runs called Internet.org.
As local markets evolve, satellite coverage is often an intermediary measure between not having any internet at all and broadband access. Internet.org asks internet service providers (ISPs) to help provide “free basics” to countries where wired internet penetration is sparse or non-existent, touting the the virtues of developing markets and appealing to the tech world’s charitable instincts.
In many countries on the continent, the ISP market is beginning to boom. Until relatively recently, internet in Kenya was largely provided by satellite through a large dish in the Rift Valley; four large submarine fiber-optic cables radically changed the way the country received the web beginning in 2009 under the acronym The East African Marine System (Teams), and now several multinational internet companies have a strong presence in the country, notably Alcatel-Lucent and Fujitsu.
But cable rolls out slowly and usually into densest markets first, where it can reward investment quickly. Satellite services such as Zuckerberg’s could provide a much-needed stopgap solution for large parts of the continent where those slowly approaching fiber-optic cables are a long way off.
http://i2.cdn.turner.com/money/dam/assets/151005141847-facebook-internet-satellite-780x439.jpg
Received on Tue Oct 06 2015 - 12:45:42 EDT
