Entrepreneur Elon Musk, who last week overtook Amazon CEO and founder Jeff Bezos as the world’s richest man thanks to the recent increase in electric carmaker Tesla’s value, is to compete with Oneweb on the new UK market for satellite-based broadband internet. Musk’s Starlink, one of a handful of companies he is the co-founder and controlling shareholder of, has been cleared by the UK communications regulator Ofcom.
The license, granted in November, allows Starlink to compete with Oneweb, the UK-founded satellite broadband company bailed out by the UK government in a £400 million deal that saw it take an ownership stake in the company late last year. The Indian company Bharti Global also invested in Oneweb, which is building a low-orbit satellite constellation designed to provide broadband internet to low-connectivity areas.
Globally, satellite-based broadband is expected to become a hugely valuable market. As well as being key to connecting remote areas it is economically unfeasible to bring cable-based internet services to. Starlink, and Oneweb, are among a handful of companies who will compete for market share over coming years.
Starlink is already installing millions of satellite dishes that will connect to its services across rural areas of the USA. The Ofcom license approves it to have dishes and receivers in the UK, to add to its networks in Greece, Germany and Australia.
Mr Musk’s stated ambition is to create a constellation of 12,000 low-orbit satellites, to deliver superfast broadband to internet blackspots around the world. So far around 1000 Starlink satellites are already in low orbit around Earth. The plan is for Musk to publicly list Starlink “once market conditions are right”.
Starlink’s UK license means the company is allowed to compete with both traditional terrestrial internet providers like BT and Sky, as well as other satellite operators like Oneweb and Inmarsat. The Daily Telegraph newspaper reports that a small number of UK households that don’t have a fibre broadband connected have already been using a trial version of the Starlink service.
Starlink’s arrival on the UK market is likely to again bring into focus the government’s support for Oneweb. The public plan is for the company to launch 650 satellites into near orbit, bringing internet access to remote areas, but there has been criticism over a perceived lack of transparency around the investment.
The government stepped in to save Oneweb, which it called a strategic UK asset, after its investors pulled out during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic, leading to its collapse. Before then, 2012-founded Oneweb had raised $3.4 billion in investment from backers that included Airbus and Softbank, the huge Japanese tech investor behind the Vision Fund.
As well as offering commercial broadband services, it is believed the government plans to use Oneweb to develop a replacement for the Galileo global positioning system it lost access to after the UK left the EU.
Low-orbit satellite constellations have been accused of ruining the night sky, and thwarting astronomers, as a result of light pollution they cause. All future Starlink satellites will be fitted with “anti-reflective” sun visors in an attempt to minimise any light pollution.