Ending years of speculation, Amazon has acknowledged that its Project Kuiper satellites will use laser-based links to communicate with each other, and says the system has already been successfully tested in orbit.
Such a system — known as optical inter-satellite links, or OISL — passes along data more quickly and efficiently than sending signals down from satellites to ground stations, through fiber-optic cables and then back up to other satellites.
“With optical inter-satellite links across our satellite constellation, Project Kuiper will effectively operate as a mesh network in space,” Rajeev Badyal, Project Kuiper’s vice president of technology, said today in a news release. “This system is designed fully in-house to optimize for speed, cost and reliability, and the entire architecture has worked flawlessly from the very start.”
Amazon said the infrared laser system was tested using two prototype satellites that were launched into low Earth orbit in October. The system was able to maintain data transmission speeds of 100 gigabits per second (Gbps) over a distance of nearly 621 miles (1,000 kilometers) during test windows lasting an hour or more.
