The deadline for Amazon to get home internet service up and running is fast approaching. Well, it could be a few years, there’s a lot to do to meet the FCC deadline or risk losing the spectrum it needs.
This new home internet service from Amazon is currently called Project Kuiper. According to the CEO of Amazon, it is now one of the main focus of the company.
Here’s what the Amazon CEO had to say in the letter to shareholders:
Kuiperi is another example of Amazon’s innovation for long-term customers in an area where there are high customer demands. Our vision for Kuiper is to create a low-Earth orbit satellite system to deliver high-quality broadband Internet service to places around the world that don’t currently have it. There are hundreds of millions of households and businesses that lack reliable access to the internet. Imagine what they will be able to do with reliable connectivity, from people taking online education courses, using financial services, starting their own businesses, shopping, entertaining, to businesses and governments improving coverage, efficiency and operations. Kuiper will provide not only accessibility, but convenience. Our teams have developed low-cost antennas (e.g. customer terminals) that will lower barriers to access. We recently unveiled the new terminals that will communicate with overhead satellites and expect to be able to produce our standard residential version for less than $400 each. They’re small—11 inches square, 1 inch thick, and weigh less than 5 pounds without the mounting bracket—but offer speeds of up to 400 megabits per second. And they’re powered by Amazon-designed baseband chips. We are preparing to launch two prototype satellites to test the entire end-to-end communications network this year and expect to be in beta with commercial customers in 2024. Customer reaction to what we have shared so far about Kuiper has been very positive and we believe Kuiper represents a great potential opportunity for Amazon. It also shares several similarities with AWS in that it is capital intensive to begin with, but has a large potential customer base of consumers, enterprises and governments, significant revenue and operating profit potential, and relatively few companies with the technical aptitude and inventiveness, as well as the investment hypothesis to follow it.
So today we’re going to break down everything we’ve learned about this new service and what we already knew.
Here’s everything we know about Amazon’s new home internet service:
Where is it today?
In October of 2022, Amazon announced that its Project Kuiper would launch more than 3,000 satellites into low-Earth orbit to deliver this home Internet service. To do so, Amazon has announced plans to build the necessary satellites in Kirkland, Washington.
Amazon has also secured a deal with ULA, Arianespace, and Blue Origin to launch these satellites into space beginning in early 2023. With this deal, Amazon hopes to launch more prototypes into space to test the system before mass production begins. .
Amazon is facing a deadline as the FCC has given until mid-2026 to have 1,600 satellites in space or risk losing FCC approval for the project.
Will it be like the old satellite internet services?
These satellites will offer far better home internet than your old satellite home internet service. With faster speeds and lower latency, Amazon hopes to become a major player in the home internet world at a time when home internet is becoming more critical than ever.
Here’s how Amazon describes these low-Earth-orbit satellites.
LEO is an area of space that extends up to 2,000 kilometers (about 1,243 miles) above the Earth. The Project Kuiper satellites will orbit between 590 and 630 kilometers (about 367 and 392 miles). The proximity of our satellites to the surface of the Earth means they can provide fast service to customers, making Project Kuiper connectivity effective for uses such as video calling, gaming and high-definition streaming.
What speeds should you expect?
Here are the three internet speed options that Amazon Home Internet will offer:
Standard This standard version will come with an 11 square antenna which will offer speeds up to 400Mbps down. This will be perfect for homes.
Professional version If you need a lot of speed, Amazon has a professional 11 by 30 antenna that can deliver speeds up to 1 Gbps. This will be perfect for companies or large families.
Portable version Now, if speed isn’t that important to you, but you want something to travel with easily, you might want Amazon’s ultraportable version which is just 7 squares and offers speeds of up to 100Mbps.
What price should you expect?
Reports are that Amazon is hoping to sell off Starlink. So look for a price of $100 or less per month. It might not sound cheap to some, but if you live in a rural area high-speed internet for under $100 is a great deal.
Here’s what Amazon had to say about the pricing of its new internet service.
Amazon hasn’t announced pricing details yet, but affordability is a key tenet of Project Kuiper. Amazon has a long-standing commitment to low prices and a lot of experience building popular low-cost devices like the Echo Dot and Fire TV Stick. We’re applying a similar approach with Project Kuiper. We also know that customer needs will vary quite a bit around the world and our service offerings may vary from country to country with the right pricing and service for customers in each region.
Final thoughts:
This could be great news for the cutters if Amazon is able to go through with their plans. Studies have shown that as more home internet options arrive, online prices have gone down and data caps have disappeared. For now, however, we have to wait as it will likely still be years before these networks become fully constructed.
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