T-Mobile recently partnered with Starlink to provide customers with connections in dead areas of reception. SAG said Starlink on T-Mobile is an example of the satellite technology being implemented in a simple and efficient way. If you step out of the land T-Mobile reception tower, your phone can passively connect to Starlink without changing the network yourself.
“They worked very closely with Google and Apple to make sure it was a super easy experience,” SAG said. “You don’t need an app, and you don’t have to click any buttons. It just works.”
Terrestrial wireless connections already have this interoperability built into it. If you travel and lose connection to the battery tower, your device may automatically connect to another near one interoperability. Satellite Internet offers the same uninterrupted experience even without a battery tower that can be connected to a phone, a tracker and a range of connected gadgets.
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Of course, Starlink’s satellite is not the only satellite on the launch pad. On the same day, T-Mobile announced its first partnership with Starlink, and the European Commission also announced that it had signed a contract to put the constellation of 290 satellites into orbit as part of the resilience, interconnection and security of its own infrastructure.
Amazon’s project Kuiper already has prototypes in the sky and aims to bring more than 3,000 satellites into orbit to provide broadband internet services. Google’s parent company Alphabet has departed from its own satellite provider Taara to better compete in the field. Three Chinese companies joined the competition, including players such as Lynk Global and Eutelsat Oneweb.
Both AT&T and Verizon have partnered with Texas satellite company AST Space Mobile to expand their coverage. (Verizon has been working with Kuiper Project since 2021.) Apple has invested $1.5 billion in satellite company Globalstar, with the goal of building its own constellation that can enable Apple devices to use emergency SOS and car crash capabilities without unit signals.
“The strengths of these global constellations and why we built them is because they have global coverage,” said Ian Christensen, senior director of private sector programs at Secure World Foundation, which advocates for cooperative and sustainable space technology. “You don’t have to worry about where to connect with the Star Link satellite, not the global satellite.”
Christensen warns that the ease of use of interoperability can be problematic. So if the Globalstar satellite works only on Apple phones and vice versa, there might be some gap in coverage. However, for the companies involved, this does not seem to be a plan. Christensen said the more likely evolution of this global network is that satellites become platforms – an agile attitude, just like the way land-based telecommunications operate.
