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Amazon to provide satellite connectivity in South America

Amazon and Vrio execs at Seattle Spheres
Executives meet up at Amazon’s HQ in Seattle to work on plans to bridge the digital divide. From left: Rajeev Badyal, vice president of Project Kuiper; Vrio President Dario Werthein; and Panos Panay, senior vice president of Amazon Devices & Services. (Business Wire Photo)

Amazon’s Project Kuiper satellite broadband network has been tapped to provide internet connectivity to customers in seven South American countries, under the terms of a newly announced deal with Vrio Corp., the parent company of DirecTV Latin America and Sky Brasil.

Vrio plans to use the Kuiper network to serve residential customers in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Uruguay. The area takes in about 383 million people, including tens of millions of people who still aren’t connected to the internet, according to World Bank estimates.

In a news release, Vrio President Dario Werthein said the collaboration with Project Kuiper addresses his company’s concerns about “bridging the technology gap and even more so the digital divide for our future generations.”

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Amazon’s Project Kuiper starts to deorbit its test satellites

"Selfie" of Kuipersat taken in orbit, with Earth in background
One of Amazon’s prototype satellites is seen in an orbital “selfie” from October 2023. (Amazon Photo)

After a series of successful tests, Amazon says it has begun the monthslong process of bringing two prototype satellites for its Project Kuiper broadband internet constellation down from orbit.

“The last milestone in our Protoflight mission is deorbiting Kuipersat-1 and Kuipersat-2,” Amazon said in an online update.

Project Kuiper is Amazon’s $10 billion initiative to provide global high-speed internet service from low Earth orbit. The project has lagged behind SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network, which already has more than 3 million customers and is partnering with T-Mobile, But Amazon has enlisted its own high-profile set of partners, including Verizon and Vodafone, and Project Kuiper’s pace has picked up over the past year.

The Kuipersat prototypes were launched in October to test the hardware and software systems that will be used for the full 3,232-satellite network. During a series of short-duration tests, they were used to transmit data for a streaming video, an Amazon purchase, a two-way video call and other applications. Amazon also tested a laser communication system for beaming data between satellites.

Project Kuiper’s orbital debris mitigation plan calls for deorbiting each satellite in its network within a year after its mission ends — which is why the controlled descent and safe disposal of the Kuipersats serve as an important final test. “This final phase in the Protoflight mission will allow us to collect data on the deorbit process as we gradually lower satellites from their initial target altitude,” Amazon said.

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Amazon takes Seattle’s satellite industry to the next level

Students in electronics lab
Students at Lake Washington Institute of Technology get hands-on lab training. (LWIT Photo)

Amazon says it’s establishing a logistics facility in Everett, Wash., and partnering with a technical college in Kirkland, Wash., to boost the supply chain and workforce pipeline for its Project Kuiper satellite broadband network.

Project Kuiper is Amazon’s $10 billion effort to build and launch more than 3,000 satellites that will offer high-speed internet access to tens of millions of people around the world. The project already employs more than 2,000 people at Puget Sound locations, including a 172,000-square-foot satellite factory in Kirkland and a 219,000-square-foot research and development facility in Redmond, Wash.

Amazon’s partnership with Lake Washington Institute of Technology in Kirkland — which is less than a 10-minute drive from the satellite factory — takes the form of a satellite technician certificate program that will prepare students for careers in aerospace assembly and manufacturing.

Brian Huseman, Amazon’s vice president of public policy and community engagement, said in a news release that the partnership “will help create a pipeline of future satellite technicians to meet the evolving needs of this area’s thriving space and satellite sectors, and give more people the opportunity to take part in Project Kuiper’s important mission.”

Some of those technicians may find themselves working at the newly announced 184,000-square-foot receiving and logistics facility in Everett, which is a half-hour drive north of Kirkland. Amazon said the hub is due to come fully online by next month, and will bring about 200 skilled technician jobs to the Everett area.

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Amazon drones advance in Arizona, retreat in California

Amazon MK30 drone
Amazon says its next-generation MK30 drone will start making deliveries later this year. (Amazon Photo)

Amazon says it’s gearing up to add a community in Arizona to its list of Prime Air drone delivery zones.

Later this year, customers in the West Valley region of the Phoenix metro area will be able to get their purchases via drones dispatched from Amazon’s Same-Day Delivery site in Tolleson, Ariz., the company said today.

The West Valley region joins College Station in Texas as an Amazon drone delivery site. Last year, Prime Air began free prescription deliveries in 60 minutes or less to customers in College Station, in partnership with Amazon Pharmacy.

For the past two years, Amazon has also been offering drone deliveries in Lockeford, Calif. — but today the company said it would be closing down that delivery site, citing the need to “prioritize our resources to continue growing the program.”

“We’ll offer all current employees opportunities at other sites, and will continue to serve customers in Lockeford with other delivery methods,” Amazon said.

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Amazon CEO’s letter gives a lift to Kuiper satellite network

United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket sends two prototype Project Kuiper satellites into orbit for Amazon in October 2023. (ULA Photo)
United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket sends two prototype Project Kuiper satellites into orbit for Amazon in October 2023. (ULA Photo)

In his annual letter to shareholders, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy says the company’s Project Kuiper satellite venture will be “a very large revenue opportunity” in the future — but he’s hedging his bets as to exactly when that future will be.

Eventually, Project Kuiper aims to provide satellite broadband service to hundreds of millions of people around the world who are currently underserved when it comes to connectivity. Such a service would compete with SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network, which already has more than 2.6 million customers.

Amazon is investing more than $10 billion to get Kuiper off the ground. The plan calls for sending 3,232 satellites (down slightly from the originally planned 3,236) into low Earth orbit by 2029. Under the terms of the Federal Communications Commission’s license, half of that total would have to be deployed by mid-2026.

When Project Kuiper’s first two prototype satellites were launched last October for testing, Amazon said that its first production-grade satellites were on track for launch in the first half of 2024, and that it expected broadband service to be in beta testing with selected customers by the end of the year.

Today, Jassy put a slightly different spin on that schedule. “We’re on track to launch our first production satellites in 2024,” he wrote in his letter. “We’ve still got a long way to go, but are encouraged by our progress.”

Jassy amplified on those remarks in an interview with CNBC. “The first big production pieces will be the second half of ’24, and we expect to have the service up in the next year or so,” he said.

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Amazon reveals that its satellites are using lasers

Illustration: Globe with satellite mesh pattern and laser connection highlighted
This graphic shows how Project Kuiper would use optical signaling between satellites. (Amazon Illustration)

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.

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IonQ and Amazon upgrade quantum cloud services

Illustration: IonQ Forte Enterprise servers
An artist’s conception shows a data center powered by IonQ’s Forte Enterprise servers. (IonQ Illustration)

IonQ has opened up its most advanced quantum computing platform for public availability through Amazon’s cloud-based Braket Direct Program, even as the Maryland-based company gears up to produce even more advanced hardware at a Seattle-area manufacturing facility.

IonQ Forte joins two earlier generations of the company’s processing hardware, Harmony and Aria, as options for Amazon Web Service’s Braket quantum computing service. Forte has been commercially available as a standalone system for months, but offering access via the cloud is expected to widen the platform’s use.

“Braket Direct provides all customers reaching the computational limits of classical computers with access to quantum technologies needed to build expertise, and expand their research and development horizon,” Richard Moulds, general manager of Amazon Braket, said in a news release. “IonQ Forte’s addition to Braket Direct furthers the collaboration between our two companies, and paves the way for exploring new quantum applications in areas like materials research, computer vision, machine learning, pharmaceuticals and more.”

Peter Chapman, the former Amazon executive who became IonQ’s CEO in 2019, said access to Forte “is imperative for users looking to optimize algorithms for trapped ions and help expand existing applications to new problem spaces.”

“We’re pleased to continue our work with AWS as we collectively work toward making quantum accessible to all,” Chapman said.

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Amazon makes a satellite launch deal with SpaceX

SpaceX Starlink launch on Falcon 9 rocket
SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket launches a set of Starlink satellites on Nov. 27. (SpaceX Photo)

Amazon’s Project Kuiper may be a competitor for SpaceX’s Starlink satellite broadband network, but business is business: Amazon says it has signed a contract for three launches of Project Kuiper satellites on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, supplementing scores of launches reserved on bigger rockets that haven’t yet made their debut.

“The additional launches with SpaceX offer even more capacity to support our deployment schedule,” Amazon said today in a news release. Amazon did not provide information about the potential timing of the launches, or their cost.

Like Starlink, Project Kuiper is designed to open up broadband internet access to tens of millions of people around the world who are underserved. SpaceX has a big head start in the market, with thousands of satellites already in orbit and more than 2 million subscribers for Starlink’s service.

Amazon, in contrast, had its first two prototype satellites sent into orbit on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket just this October. A couple of weeks ago, Amazon reported that the satellites passed a monthlong series of tests, opening the way for satellites to be mass-produced at a factory in Kirkland, Wash. (For what it’s worth, SpaceX’s satellites are built nearby at the company’s Redmond facility.)

Project Kuiper’s first production-quality satellites are due to be launched early next year, with beta service to begin in the latter half of 2024. At least half of Project Kuiper’s planned 3,236-satellite constellation will have to be placed in low Earth orbit by mid-2026 to comply with the terms of Amazon’s license from the Federal Communications Commission. But the vast majority of launches that Amazon has reserved would use three types of rockets that haven’t yet flown a single mission: Blue Origin’s New Glenn, ULA’s Vulcan and Arianespace’s Ariane 6.

In addition to the three newly reserved Falcon 9 launches, Amazon has slots set aside on eight Atlas V rockets — a tried-and-true product line that is reaching its final days. So even though SpaceX and Amazon could be considered satellite network rivals, and even though SpaceX founder Elon Musk and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos haven’t always been on the best of terms, the Falcon 9 reservations represent something of an insurance policy for Amazon’s deployment schedule.

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Amazon’s Project Kuiper plays up satellite synergies

A Project Kuiper satellite terminal is set up with a wind farm in the background
A Project Kuiper satellite terminal is set up with a wind farm in the background. (Amazon Photo)

As Amazon gears up to build and launch thousands of satellites for its Project Kuiper constellation, it’s talking up the space-based broadband network’s potential to enable new options for managing data traffic with Amazon Web Services — including private connectivity services that never touch the public internet.

Amazon also announced that Japan’s Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp., NTT Docomo and SKY Perfect JSAT have formed a strategic collaboration with Project Kuiper to bring advanced satellite connectivity options to their customers. NTT and SKY Perfect JSAT plan to distribute Kuiper services to enterprises and government organizations in Japan, while NTT Group companies will use Project Kuiper to boost wireless broadband connectivity for customers.

NTT and its associated companies, along with SKY Perfect JSAT, join Verizon and Vodafone as telecom partners for Amazon’s Project Kuiper, which aims to provide broadband data services to tens of millions of people around the world who are currently underserved.

Such partners are expected to be among the first beta testers for Project Kuiper’s network in the second half of 2024. Two weeks ago, Amazon said that two prototype satellites achieved a “100% success rate” in a series of orbital tests, opening the way for mass production to begin next month at a factory in Kirkland, Wash.

Project Kuiper is far behind SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network, which already has more than 2 million subscribers. Starlink’s satellites are built in Redmond, Wash., not far from Project Kuiper’s HQ. To catch up with Starlink, Amazon plans to leverage synergies with AWS as well as the company’s other lines of business, including Prime Video and online retail sales.

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Amazon says its Kuiper satellites aced orbital tests

Flight director at Amazon Project Kuiper mission operations center
A flight director watches over Project Kuiper’s mission operations center in Redmond, Wash. (Amazon Photo)

Amazon’s Project Kuiper satellite network streamed its first video and facilitated its first online sale during a monthlong series of orbital tests that the company says achieved a “100% success rate.”

The performance of the two prototype satellites, known as KuiperSat 1 and 2, validated Amazon’s satellite design and will open the way for mass production to begin in earnest next month at a factory in Kirkland, Wash., said Rajeev Badyal, vice president of technology for Project Kuiper.

“It’s been an incredible success for the team, for Kuiper, and partly because everything we did went like clockwork,” Badyal said. “There were no fires to fight, so to speak. In some ways, the team made it look very easy. As you know very well, these things are extremely difficult to do. But everything we built, all the designs are working as designed, and the results we’re getting are nominal or better.”

The prototype satellites were launched into low Earth orbit from Florida on Oct. 6 atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, and after testing the satellites’ maneuverability, Amazon verified end-to-end network functionality last week. Further tests will be conducted in the months ahead while satellite production ramps up, Amazon said.

Project Kuiper is designed to provide affordable broadband internet access from above for tens of millions of people around the world who are underserved.

It’s been only four years since Kuiper came into the public spotlight — and Amazon is far behind SpaceX’s rival Starlink satellite network, which already has more than 2 million subscribers. But Project Kuiper aims to take advantage of synergies with Amazon’s other business lines, ranging from online retail sales to Amazon Prime Video and Amazon Web Services.

The tests conducted over the past month served as a demonstration of those synergies as well as confirmation that Project Kuiper’s hardware, software and ground-based infrastructure are on the right track.

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