INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Y Combinator-backed startup Astranis is now set to launch its first commercial telecommunication satellite aboard a Falcon 9 rocket, with a
launch time frame currently set for sometime starting in the fourth quarter of next year
and they hope to do so using low-cost satellites that massively undercut the price of existing global telecommunications hardware, which can
easier to make, which changes the economics of deployment for potential carrier and connectivity provider partners
Its approach has already attracted the partnership of Microcom subsidiary Pacific Dataport, an Anchorage company that was formed to expand
satellite broadband access in Alaska
in 2018 to show that its tech could work as advertised
service, as opposed to using a large constellation of low Earth orbit satellites that offer coverage because one or more are bound to be
over the coverage area at any given time as they orbit the Earth, handing off connections from one to the next.
