China faces a difficult task if it wants to catch up with Elon Musk’s SpaceX satellite service.
SpaceX’s Starlink already has nearly 7,000 satellites in orbit, serving about 5 million customers in more than 100 countries, according to SpaceX. The service is designed to provide high-speed internet to customers in remote and underserved areas.
SpaceX hopes to expand its megaconstellation to as many as 42,000 satellites. China is targeting a similar scale and hopes to have about 38,000 satellites across its three low-Earth orbit internet projects, namely Qianfan, State Grid and Honghu-3.
In addition to Starlink, Europe-based OneWeb More than 630 low Earth orbit (LEO) internet satellites have also been launched. Amazon There are also plans to build a large LEO constellation, currently called Project Kuiper, consisting of more than 3,000 satellites, although the company has only launched two prototype satellite So far.
With competition so fierce, why would China bother investing money and energy in building such a huge constellation?
“Starlink has really shown that it can provide Internet access to individuals and citizens in remote corners and provide citizens with the ability to access the Internet and any website, any application they want,” said Steve Fei, a senior researcher at the company. Durstein said.
“A big push for China is to censor content that citizens can access,” Feldstein said. “So for them, they say, ‘Well, this poses a real threat. If Starlink can provide If our citizens or individuals from countries allied to us provide uncensored content, then this may indeed breach our censorship regime.
Blaine Curcio, founder of Orbital Gateway Consulting, agrees. “In some countries, China may see this as almost a differentiating factor. It’s like: ‘Okay, maybe we’re not going to market as quickly, but hey, if you want us to do that, we’ll review yours. network.
Experts say that while China Constellation will not become the internet provider of choice in places like the United States, Western Europe, Canada and other U.S. allies, many other regions could be open to Chinese services.
“There are several geographical areas that may be particularly attractive to Starlink-like competitors, especially those made in China, including China itself,” said Juliana Suess, a researcher at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs. “For example, , Russia, Afghanistan and Syria are not yet covered by Starlink, and most of Africa is not yet covered.”
“We see that 70% of the 4G infrastructure on the continent is already built by Huawei,” Suess added. “So having a space-based perspective could lead to further progress on that front.”
In addition to being a tool of geopolitical influence, having a proprietary satellite network constellation is increasingly becoming a national security necessity, especially when terrestrial network infrastructure is damaged during war.
“When it comes to the role of Starlink technology on the battlefield in Ukraine, one of the big leaps we’re seeing is the emergence of drone warfare and the connected battlefield,” Feldstein said. “Having satellite weapons is seen as critical. Important military advantage. So I think China sees this and says investing in this is absolutely critical to our national security goals.”
watch video Learn more about why China is building these megaconstellations and the challenges the country will face.
