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Sunil Mittal owned Bharti Enterprises, the parent company of Airtel, has acquired a strategic minority stake in a global consortium initiative aimed at providing affordable internet access to all.
The initiative, called OneWeb , has been launched with $500 million funding from a number of global players including Virgin Group, Airbus Group, Coca-Cola Company, Intelsat and Grupo Salinas. The project is expected to go live in 2019.
OneWeb aims to build a communications network with an initial constellation of 648 Low Earth Orbit satellites that will provide connectivity to billions of people around the world. The OneWeb user terminals contain embedded LTE, 3G, 2G and Wifi access capabilities that extend the reach of mobile operators. With more than 10 terabits per second of new capacity, the system will transparently extend the networks of mobile operators and ISPs to serve new coverage areas, bringing voice and data access to consumers, businesses, schools, healthcare institutions.
Bharti will have representation on the board of the company. The Indian conglomerate will be able to leverage the investment by becoming a preferred distributor of these services across its operations in India and Africa.
Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman, Bharti Enterprises said, “Access to affordable high speed Internet is a powerful tool for economic development and empowerment of populations, particularly in emerging economies. OneWeb, an innovative system backed by leading global corporations, will complement the efforts of Governments and telecom operators across the globe to take internet to the masses.”
“In India, which is on the cusp of a massive data revolution, hundreds millions of consumers in rural areas will benefit from this initiative and it will boost the Government’s Digital India program and its vision of broadband access for all. Similarly, nations across Africa will be able to fulfill their digital inclusion agenda and aid economic growth through these affordable,” he added.
OneWeb has a joint venture with Airbus Space and Defence to build the highest volume satellite production factory in the world. , OneWeb also announced the largest commercial rocket acquisition ever of more than 65 rockets from Arianespace and Virgin Galactic. Arianespace will be providing 21 Soyuz rockets from 3 separate launch pads on a firm schedule, 5 Soyuz options and 3 Ariane 6 options. Virgin Galactic will be providing 39 separate launches.
OneWeb has raised investment from Airbus Group, The Coca-Cola Company, Grupo Salinas, Hughes Network Systems, Intelsat, Qualcomm Incorporated and Virgin Group.
“This project is exciting because it combines commerce with purpose,” said Muhtar Kent, Chairman and CEO, The Coca-Cola Company. “We believe it will help spur local economic development where people are in the greatest need, while also helping our business by improving real-time access to some of the world’s most remote areas where we are already active in helping provide opportunities for entrepreneurs.”
“OneWeb is a game-changing next generation satellite system,” said Pradman Kaul, President of Hughes. “We have been looking at every detail and are excited to participate both in the design, development and production of the ground system. In addition, we will employ the OneWeb network to deliver services to our global base of customers and distribution partners.”
How it works?
OneWeb satellites will provide high speed connectivity to a small user terminal which transmits broadband access via wifi, LTE, 3G and 2G to the surrounding area. This access will operate on mobile operators billing platform with the mobile operators cell phone. In other words, any Bharti user who walks near a terminal, if there is no macrocell tower around, or if the terminal is used for densification (i.e. the macro tower is overloaded), then the cell phone will connect to the terminal and operate as normal, using either the prepaid or postpaid billing platform of Bharti. Thus, any user handset can “roam” onto the OneWeb network, but of course they wouldn’t know The terminals can be optionally solar powered and used as Community Access Points on schools, health centers or other locations. The terminals can be placed on any home or business and an RJ45 cable can be run into the house to connect to a small device similar to a cable modem. At the same time the terminal would, if necessary provide the local wireless coverage.
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