SpaceX Concedes Starlink Altitude But System Changes Maintain Chokehold Over Amazon

[Elderberry]

WCCFTECH By Ramish Zafar 11/19/2020

As it battles terrestrial broadband service providers to keep access to the 12GHz spectrum for its Starlink consumer terminals, SpaceX has made an important concession to Kuiper Systems LLC (an Amazon subsidiary) with regards to its third proposed Starlink modification. SpaceX asked the FCC to allow it to change the orbital altitudes, planes and angles of its satellites earlier this year, with the company's promises to its customers depending to a large extent on this change.

Now, in a commitment letter filed by SpaceX's head of satellite policy Mr. David Golman, the company has acquiesced to Amazon's demand of removing the orbital overlap between some Starlink and Kuiper satellites and increasing the distance between them. The letter comes as Amazon raised safety concerns for its satellites in several meetings with the FCC.

SpaceX's Concession To Amazon Hopes To Enable A Polar Starlink Launch In December – But Will It Mark The End Of Company's Battle With Future Competitor?

The concession relates to Starlink's cluster that operates in a shell of 570 kilometers in altitude with 20 satellites each in 36 orbital planes. SpaceX's modification request asked the FCC to allow the company to cut the altitude of this cluster in half from an earlier value of 1,300 kilometers. A part of Amazon's Kuiper constellation will operate at an altitude of 590 kilometers, and SpaceX's orbital tolerance lets the company either reduce or increase Starlink's altitude by 30 kilometers.

More: https://wccftech.com/spacex-starlink-altitude-concession-system-change-amazon/

[Elderberry]

Amazon’s Project Kuiper is More Than the Company’s Response to SpaceX

IEEE Spectrum by Michael Koziol 8/17/2020

https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/aerospace/satellites/amazons-project-kuiper-is-more-than-the-companys-response-to-spacex

Amazon Web Services and Blue Origin could mean the satellite constellation becomes part of a larger ecosystem

Amazon cleared an important hurdle when the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced on 30 July that the company was authorized to deploy and operate its Kuiper satellite constellation. The authorization came with the caveat that Amazon would still have to demonstrate that Kuiper would not interfere with previously authorized satellite projects, such as SpaceX’s Starlink.

Even with the FCC’s caveat, it’s tempting to imagine that the idea of putting a mega-constellation of thousands of satellites in low-Earth orbit to provide uninterrupted broadband access anywhere on Earth will become a battle between Jeff Bezos’ Kuiper and Elon Musk’s Starlink. After all, even in space, how much room can there be for two mega-constellations, let alone additional efforts like that of the recently-beleaguered OneWeb? But some experts suggest that Amazon’s real play will come from its ability to vertically integrate Kuiper into the rest of the Amazon ecosystem—an ability SpaceX cannot match with Starlink.

“With Amazon, it’s a whole different ballgame,” says Zac Manchester, an assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics at Stanford University. “The thing that makes Amazon different from SpaceX and OneWeb is they have so much other stuff going for them.” If Kuiper succeeds, Amazon can not only offer global satellite broadband access—it can include that access as part of its Amazon Web Services (AWS), which already offers resources for cloud computing, machine learning, data analytics, and more.

More at link.