Europe Wants Its Own Alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink Network

[su27k]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-16/europe-wants-its-own-alternative-to-elon-musk-s-starlink-network

European nations want to build a 6 billion-euro ($7.3 billion) alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink network so the region isn’t left behind in the race to develop satellite broadband.

European Union officials signed off on a study for a low-earth orbit constellation similar to Starlink that would offer secure government communications and bring internet to isolated communities, French newspaper Les Echos reported, citing unnamed people in the bloc’s Commission.

The EU could make an announcement about a satellite constellation on Thursday, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg, without giving further details.

[freddo411]

This is disappointing. Starlink is inherently global and  could serve  Europe extremely well.

[Asteroza]

If brexit hadn't happened, OneWeb being acquired by the UK/EU would have satisfied that need...

[Lar]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-16/europe-wants-its-own-alternative-to-elon-musk-s-starlink-network

European nations want to build a 6 billion-euro ($7.3 billion) alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink network so the region isn’t left behind in the race to develop satellite broadband.

European Union officials signed off on a study for a low-earth orbit constellation similar to Starlink that would offer secure government communications and bring internet to isolated communities, French newspaper Les Echos reported, citing unnamed people in the bloc’s Commission.

The EU could make an announcement about a satellite constellation on Thursday, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg, without giving further details.

7 billion is low cost? There's no way that SpaceX will have invested anywhere near that amount, IMHO, before the system and its growth are self funding, and shortly thereafter, starts throwing off vast sums of cash while still growing.  No government program can do that.

[Steven Pietrobon]

This is disappointing. Starlink is inherently global and  could serve  Europe extremely well.

Yes, but the euros would be heading to the US instead of Europe and it would be at the whim of US political interference. The EU can easily afford its own system (its GDP is only 9% less than the US) so that it too can provide a global system that would also serve the US extremely well. :-)

[Danderman]

It’s just a study.

[NosFi]

Internet for isolated communities? In Europe?
We are 3 times more densly populated than the USA.

Please don't waste my money on that and better spend that money on rolling out Fibre optics faster

[eeergo]

It’s just a study.

(Unfortunately, even though my dayjob would benefit from it) it's intended as something more than just a study:

https://twitter.com/Megaconstellati/status/1339481909773160449

[rklaehn]

Hopefully that does not mean they will outlaw Starlink to make their own offering competitive. I would not be surprised by such an action.

[Hobbes-22]

Internet for isolated communities? In Europe?
We are 3 times more densly populated than the USA.

Please don't waste my money on that and better spend that money on rolling out Fibre optics faster

Don't assume  average density = density everywhere. Europe has large, thinly populated areas in e.g. Sweden, Norway, Finland, Spain, France. Isolated communities on a large number of small islands.

[eeergo]

Internet for isolated communities? In Europe?
We are 3 times more densly populated than the USA.

Please don't waste my money on that and better spend that money on rolling out Fibre optics faster

Don't assume  average density = density everywhere. Europe has large, thinly populated areas in e.g. Sweden, Norway, Finland, Spain, France. Isolated communities on a large number of small islands.

Spain for example has put in place very strong, pluripartisan fiber-tending programs, including through rural or non-profitable areas, that make its data ground infrastructure the most developed in Europe (more FTTH than France, Italy, Germany and UK combined, at 80.4% of connected homes, the perspective to reach >90% in one year's time, and 100% including rural communities in 2025), one of the best in the world - in spite of the large swaths of territory that are sparsely populated and the off-mainland archipielagos.

It would be against its interests and investments to strongly support maintenance-intenstive, non-resilient megaconstellations instead of the more robust ground technology it has become a forefront player on. Of course, if Spain can do this, most mid-sized countries with a reasonably large economy can too.

A good review (in Spanish): https://www.xataka.com/otros/estado-conexion-fibra-espana-2020-cobertura-actual-planes-operadoras-para-proximos-anos

[edzieba]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-16/europe-wants-its-own-alternative-to-elon-musk-s-starlink-network

European nations want to build a 6 billion-euro ($7.3 billion) alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink network so the region isn’t left behind in the race to develop satellite broadband.

European Union officials signed off on a study for a low-earth orbit constellation similar to Starlink that would offer secure government communications and bring internet to isolated communities, French newspaper Les Echos reported, citing unnamed people in the bloc’s Commission.

The EU could make an announcement about a satellite constellation on Thursday, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg, without giving further details.

7 billion is low cost? There's no way that SpaceX will have invested anywhere near that amount, IMHO, before the system and its growth are self funding, and shortly thereafter, starts throwing off vast sums of cash while still growing.  No government program can do that.

SpaceX did it with less, so therefore it's impossible to do it with more?

Sovereignty concerns are just as valid for high-bandwidth satellite networking as satellite positioning systems (Galileo), or satellite weather monitoring & climate science (Copernicus), or inter-satellite data links (EDRS), etc. With US companies being subject to US jurisdiction, and the last 4 years providing an object demonstration that the US cannot be considered a reliable international partner, there is a desire to have independent and locally operated systems, including networking and data services in general. This is both at the hardware, software, and service levels (why there is a focus on US-located data processors like Google, Facebook, etc). Global networking coverage falls into a similar situation as global positioning coverage: you want access everywhere, without being beholden to someone else.

[daedalus1]

I think everyone will want what Musk has got. The problem there is that it is easier said than done.

[Star One]

This is disappointing. Starlink is inherently global and  could serve  Europe extremely well.

Yes, but the euros would be heading to the US instead of Europe and it would be at the whim of US political interference. The EU can easily afford its own system (its GDP is only 9% less than the US) so that it too can provide a global system that would also serve the US extremely well. :-)

Precisely not everyone wants to be at the behest of some US private company. I imagine that could possibly be the thinking in certain European nations.

[Star One]

I think everyone will want what Musk has got. The problem there is that it is easier said than done.

No that’s just you assuming everyone will want what he has.

[Hauerg]

I think everyone will want what Musk has got. The problem there is that it is easier said than done.

No that’s just you assuming everyone will want what he has.

Not much to aasume here:
„Everyone“ wants BEVs as good as Teslas.
„Everyone“ wants his rockets to be reusable and cheaper.
Seems Starlink is the next on the list.

[Hauerg]

Internet for isolated communities? In Europe?
We are 3 times more densly populated than the USA.

Please don't waste my money on that and better spend that money on rolling out Fibre optics faster

I have heard „fibre!!“ for how many decades now?
And still the best wires can do where I live is 16Mbit.

[Davidthefat]

Haven't really been paying attention to Starlink and other internet constellations, but what advantage do they have over a few dedicated satellites in GEO? If the intent is to only serve far outlying communities within a relatively small area, it seems like it's a better to invest in a few big satellites than dozens/hundreds of smaller ones. Especially given the costs of launching with an Ariane (assuming EU will want EU satellites to launch with ESA assets), economically, it seems cheaper to go the GEO route. They probably can take an existing satellite bus (Like a Eurostar?) instead of developing a brand new one designed to be deployed as a constellation (low volume, high density satellites)

[cdebuhr]

Haven't really been paying attention to Starlink and other internet constellations, but what advantage do they have over a few dedicated satellites in GEO? If the intent is to only serve far outlying communities within a relatively small area, it seems like it's a better to invest in a few big satellites than dozens/hundreds of smaller ones. Especially given the costs of launching with an Ariane (assuming EU will want EU satellites to launch with ESA assets), economically, it seems cheaper to go the GEO route. They probably can take an existing satellite bus (Like a Eurostar?) instead of developing a brand new one designed to be deployed as a constellation (low volume, high density satellites)

Low latency.  The latency problem alone renders GSO-based satellite internet nearly unusable for modern applications by any account I've heard.

[woods170]

Hopefully that does not mean they will outlaw Starlink to make their own offering competitive. I would not be surprised by such an action.

The European Union (EU) cannot actually do that without violating its own laws and laws of many of its member states.

For example, the EU has its own navigation system (Galileo) but it cannot force EU citizens or companies to exclusively use Galileo instead of GPS. Reason: both EU laws and the constitution of most EU countries prohibit this.

Same for an EU version of Starlink.