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Elon Musk reveals plan to put internet connectivity in space

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

At the SpaceX event held in Seattle, Elon Musk revealed his grand (and expensive) $10 billion plan to build internet connectivity in space. Musk’s vision wants to radically change the way we access internet. His plan includes putting satellites in space, between which data packets would bounce around before being passed down to Earth. Right now, data packets bounce about the various networks via routers.

Some say that Elon Musk’s ambitious project would enable a Smartphone to access the internet just like it communicates with GPS satellites. SpaceX will launch its satellites in a low orbit, so as to reduce communication lag. While geosynchronous communication satellites orbit the Earth from an altitude of 22,000 miles, SpaceX’s satellites would be orbiting the Earth from an altitude of 750 miles.

Once Musk’s system is in place, data packets would simply be sent to space, from where they would bounce about the satellites, and ultimately be sent back to Earth. “The speed of light is 40 percent faster in the vacuum of space than it is for fiber,” says Musk, which is why he believes that his unnamed SpaceX venture is the future of internet connectivity, replacing traditional routers and networks.

The project is based out of SpaceX’s new Seattle office. It will initially start out with 60 workers, but Musk predicts that the workforce may grow to over 1,000 in three to four years. Musk wants “the best engineers that either live in Seattle or that want to move to the Seattle area and work on electronics, software, structures, and power systems,” to work with SpaceX.

Source: techinfomer.com

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