{"id":33352,"date":"2023-01-09T08:07:20","date_gmt":"2023-01-09T08:07:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ispreview.co.uk\/?p=33352"},"modified":"2023-01-09T09:24:05","modified_gmt":"2023-01-09T09:24:05","slug":"british-satellite-broadband-firm-oneweb-shut-alaska-site-over-cost-and-technical-woes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ispreview.co.uk\/index.php\/2023\/01\/british-satellite-broadband-firm-oneweb-shut-alaska-site-over-cost-and-technical-woes.html","title":{"rendered":"British Satellite Broadband Firm OneWeb Shut Alaska Site Over Cost and Technical Woes"},"content":{"rendered":"

British registered satellite<\/a> operator OneWeb<\/a>, which is partly owned by the UK Government, has closed one of its first – and most heavily promoted – test sites in Alaska after the Alaska Telecom Association (ATA) and local providers complained that the service was “too costly to adopt<\/em>” and was “discontinued due to ongoing technical difficulties<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

OneWeb<\/a> has so far launched 502 of their small c.150kg LEO based ultrafast (100Mbps+) and low-latency (sub-100ms) broadband satellites into space – orbiting at an altitude of 1,200km above the Earth – and their initial plan is to build a constellation of 648 (588 for coverage and the rest are redundancy), which is enough for a good level of global coverage. This is due to be completed by the end of 2023.<\/p>\n

NOTE:<\/strong> OneWeb<\/a>’s commercial service initially serves parts of the UK, Alaska, Canada, Northern Europe, Greenland, Iceland, and the Arctic seas.<\/div>\n

At present, OneWeb’s service is largely still focused on serving government, maritime, aviation and enterprise needs rather than community connectivity. Community broadband and mobile connectivity for homes is still expected to come later, such as via partner ISPs like BT<\/a> (here<\/a>) and Eutelsat<\/a> (KONNECT<\/a>), albeit probably only after the full first-generation (GEN1) constellation has launched.<\/p>\n

However, the test site in the village of Akiak<\/strong> (Alaska) was one of the first to demonstrate the benefits of using OneWeb’s satellites to provide faster broadband to such a remote community (this seems to have been distributed via fixed wireless to local homes), which was heavily promoted by the operator. The setup for this was well detailed in a promotional video that was released only six months ago.<\/p>\n