SMBs around the world will benefit from yet another company offering ultra-fast broadband. Amazon just announced hardware requirements for Project Kuiper, a low-cost global internet service with the potential to deliver lots of data with low latency.
The online shopping giant and cloud computing leader plans to launch a global megacluster of satellites into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) to provide affordable internet access worldwide.
LEOs orbit much closer to Earth than larger GSOs/GEO satellites, which is why they are so small. That means you need more LEOs for decent coverage; However, the extra capacity can deliver a lot of data with fast latencies (often around 20-40ms) provided there are enough ground stations.
The Kuiper project will use the 17.8-18.6 GHz band and the 28.6-29.1 GHz frequencies to communicate with ground stations.
Amazon is currently authorized to deploy and operate its own constellation of 3,236 LEO satellites as part of Project Kuiper. The company had said it would launch half of its constellation by July 2026 (FCC requirements), followed by the rest by mid-2029 – well behind its UK-based competitors SpaceX Starlink and OneWeb.
Project Kuiper kit & speeds
Project Kuiper will deliver three customer terminals (dish antenna) to customers. The smallest (7 square inches) will go to residential customers around the world; A larger version (11 inches square and 1 inch thick) suits business and home users alike, while the largest terminal (19 inches x 30 inches) caters equally to high-demand corporate, telecom and government customers.
The ultra-compact model with the smallest dimensions offers broadband speeds up to 100 Mbps (megabits per second), while the standard model can deliver 400 Mbps and the largest model up to 1 Gbit/s (gigabits per second). Unfortunately, we don’t yet know what upload speeds or ultimate latency will be achieved; However, we assume that they are similar to those of Starlink.
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Businesses will likely be drawn to the larger terminals, so the question becomes: how much does this kit cost? Amazon hasn’t given details on pricing or service packages yet, but they did mention that smaller terminals cost less than $500 (£411) to manufacture.
Rajeev Badyal, Amazon’s VP of Technology for Project Kuiper said:
“Our goal with Project Kuiper is not only to connect unserved and underserved communities, but to inspire them with the quality, reliability and value of their service. From day one, every technology and business decision we’ve made has focused on what provides the best experience for different customers around the world, and our customer terminal offering reflects those decisions.”
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