Thirty-six satellites launched into orbit on Friday aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket, which OneWeb acquired from European aerospace company Arianespace.
These satellites will join another 74 that OneWeb launched into space before declaring bankruptcy in March, citing problems in securing additional funding, while investors tightened their belts in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic. OneWeb’s biggest financial supporter for most of its existence has been Softbank, which has come under increasing pressure from its investors to move away from riskier companies after a series of bad bets on tech companies.
OneWeb has suspended operations for most of 2020 as it has undergone the restructuring of Chapter 11. The British government and India-based Bharti Global have become major shareholders in OneWeb after investing $ 1 billion in shares during the proceedings. of bankruptcy.
Building a massive constellation of satellites that connect to the internet is not an easy task: several companies have tried and failed to bring such a business model to life in the 1990s, but all have passed, thrown in their towel. they drastically changed their business plan after the realization of such a plan was much more expensive than previously thought.
But a cohort of companies are trying again, and OneWeb’s toughest competition will come from Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which has already launched about 1,000 satellites, brought its service to early beta testers and expects to launch its business next year.
The company, which says its constellation will require only 650 satellites, plans to launch its service by the end of 2021 and will focus on providing services to companies, rather than directly to consumers.
