What is the Internet of Things Constellation Plan?

After several delays, OneWeb, one of the most striking companies in the commercial aerospace field, successfully launched the first batch of six Internet satellites in French Guiana on Wednesday.

OneWeb was founded on 20 12, and they plan to deploy 648 small satellites in low earth orbit to form a global satellite communication network. These satellites, which are only the size of refrigerators, will run in low orbit at an altitude of about 1200 km.

According to the BBC, after the first six satellites are launched, OneWeb will start launching more satellites this fall. Finally, OneWeb plans to send another 65,438+0,330 satellites with different heights into space, bringing the company's total number of satellites to 65,438+0,980.

"Our goal is to make OneWeb network provide seamless global Internet coverage in 20021year." The company said on Twitter.

Since its establishment, OneWeb has attracted Airbus, Qualcomm, Virgin Group, Boeing, Coca-Cola and other companies to participate in the investment, and Softbank has invested a total of US$ 654.38+0.5 billion. This makes OneWeb one of the companies with the strongest financing ability in the commercial aerospace field.

In order to realize its "constellation plan" as soon as possible, OneWeb needs to mass-produce satellites quickly. It introduces the concept of automobile manufacturing, modularizes the satellite system and uses a lot of automation equipment in the production line.

In this mode, OneWeb's "satellite factory" can produce 16 satellites a week and 648 satellites a year. Mass production can reduce the production cost of satellites. The goal of 20 15 is to reduce the cost of each communication satellite to 500,000 US dollars.

OneWeb is not a pioneer of "space internet", but a representative enterprise of a new wave of satellite craze. As early as the 1990s, a wave of broadband communication satellites appeared, the most famous of which was the Iridium project supported by Motorola, which achieved global network coverage through a constellation of 77 satellites (later reduced to 66).

However, because Iridium project can't provide personal mobile communication service based on mobile phone, the use cost is too high, and it is quickly surpassed by mobile phone communication network. Because it could not form a stable customer base, it eventually went bankrupt after the successful construction of $5 billion. This has also become a turning point for Motorola from prosperity to decline.

During the same period, Teledesic and other companies supported by Bill Gates started ambitious "Internet in the air" plans, but after the soaring cost and the exhaustion of investors' funds, they died with the bursting of the Internet bubble in 2000.

A new wave of satellite communication companies represented by OneWeb and Starlink has made remarkable progress compared with the previous generation of dreamers. The "catfish effect" of commercial aerospace companies such as Space Exploration Technology Company and Blue Origin is rapidly reducing the cost of rocket launch. The miniaturization of computers makes smaller and cheaper satellites possible.

Although there are three application directions in the commercial satellite field at present, the application in the communication field is the focus of this round of constellation construction upsurge.

After all, more than half of the world's population is not connected to the Internet, and the places that are not covered by the ground information superhighway will be the new continent to be reclaimed by satellite communication. With the advent of the 5G era, the space Internet will have greater advantages than the terrestrial Internet.

According to Morgan Stanley's forecast, the scale of aerospace industry will increase from $350 billion in 20 16 to more than $1 trillion in 2040. Half of this growth will come from new internet satellites.

Constellations currently in orbit and planned to be launched

Competing with OneWeb for the leading position in the industry is Starlink. As early as February 22, 20 18, two experimental satellites Microsat2-A/-B of Starlink were launched with Falcon 9.

In fact, Xinglian is a space project brewed by Space Exploration Technology Company 20 15. The goal is to launch 4,425 broadband satellites in the first stage and 75 18 satellites in the second stage, bringing the total number to 65,438+200,000. This number has exceeded the total number of satellites launched in human history. These satellites are all designed with standard products and launched by the same rocket Falcon 9.

Greg Wyler, the founder of OneWeb, made a tit-for-tat response to Starlink's crazy constellation plan. He said in an interview, "We have carefully designed more efficient satellites with higher on-board capabilities. So we don't need so many cheap small satellites anymore. The challenge of space debris is the main responsibility of everyone in the industry. We cannot turn space into a dangerous place. "

In fact, space exploration technology company has been evaluating the impact of dense satellite clusters on near-earth space. On October 20 18, 165438+ 10, Space Exploration Technology Company revised the Star Alliance Plan. After modification, the total number of satellites to be launched in the first phase is reduced to 1584.

The internet giants who rushed in front of the last wave of communication satellites will naturally not be absent this time. After all, whoever can take the lead in connecting more than 3 billion unconnected people around the world will have the key to open the next 1 100 million application. Google, Facebook and so on. They are all laid out early, aiming at this "unrelated market dividend".

As early as the beginning of 20 10, Google launched the "O3b Plan" together with HSBC and European cable TV operator Liberty Global. The original meaning of O3b is "other 3 billion", which refers to the number of people who still can't access the Internet.

Due to the departure of several executives, Google's satellite internet access plan is not progressing smoothly. Greg Wyler is the project leader. After leaving Google, he re-established his own company OneWeb.

After the satellite internet access plan was frustrated, Google turned to Space Exploration Technology Company, and invested 10 billion US dollars with Fidelity in Space Exploration Technology Company in 20 15 years. In addition to providing satellite images for Google Earth with the help of imaging satellites launched by Space Exploration Technology Company, another purpose is to establish a space Internet consisting of 4,000 satellites.

Facebook once chose Space X to provide Internet services for backward areas such as Africa. However, the Falcon 9 rocket exploded before the launch in 20 16, and two Facebook Internet satellites worth $200 million were unfortunately destroyed.

Last year, documents released by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) showed that PointView Tech LLC, a subsidiary of Facebook founded on 20 17, was investing millions of dollars in the research and development of experimental satellites. This satellite named Athena will transmit data 10 times faster than the Starlink satellite network.

In addition to Internet giants, companies including Boeing, SES O3b, ViaSat, Telesat and LeoSat are also actively "staking the land" in space.

And China is not far behind in the field of Internet satellites. According to statistics, there are currently more than 16 constellation plans in China. Among them, there are both national teams and non-governmental forces. China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation and China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation have both launched their own LEO communication projects, namely "Hongyan Constellation" system and "Lucky Plan".

20 18 18 On February 22nd and 29th, the first experimental satellites of "Hongyun Project" and "Hongyan Constellation" were launched successively.

According to The Wall Street Journal, by the end of 20 18, about 80 space technology start-ups in China had invested in this field, and space has become a "new frontier" for China enterprises.

The representative force of commercial aviation is Galaxy Aerospace, which was founded by Xu Ming, former president of Cheetah Mobile. From 2065438 to 2008, the third round of A financing was completed successively, with investors including Shunwei Capital, Morningside Capital, IDG Capital, Gao Rong Capital, Source Capital and Junlian Capital, with a valuation of 3.5 billion yuan.

The "Galaxy" low-orbit broadband satellite constellation in the Galaxy space planning will be composed of thousands of self-developed 5G communication satellites, and the Internet mode of "small steps and quick iteration" will be adopted, so that the satellite access cost will be lower than OneWeb.

Although the space exploration technology company has greatly reduced the launch cost of rockets, it still focuses on government-oriented services, which is not much different from the traditional aerospace industry. However, OneWeb may change the current pattern of communication industry and open up new space in aerospace industry for the first time.

In the 5G era, satellite networks and terrestrial communication networks will truly become a unified network. In the 5G communication standard, LEO communication satellite will become a node of 5G communication network. With the increasingly complex communication structure (faster speed and higher bandwidth) and the networking requirements for complex environments such as oceans, deserts and snowy mountains, LEO satellite networks will become an important supplement to submarine optical cables and ground base stations.

The coverage of "air base stations" such as LEO satellites in Fiona Fang can reach thousands of kilometers. According to Xu Ming's estimation, if every corner of the world is to be networked, the cost of investing in LEO communication satellites may be reduced to 1% of the cost of base station construction.

It is understood that after OneWeb, Galaxy Aerospace will launch the first self-developed low-orbit satellite (experimental star) in the second half of this year.