Starlink · Amazon · SpaceX · Elon Musk · Ars Technica
Amazon assembles 1,000th satellite, is readying space internet service by end of year
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The world’s largest retailer wants to sell you something else—Internet from space.
Key facts
- And so they took an empty 170,000-square-foot building in December 2022, and they turned it over the next 15 months into a satellite factory, and they built the first qualification satellite there, right
- SMC-S-016 is a great example of that, and that’s where they started, right
- In a wide-ranging interview this week with Badyal and two other senior Amazon officials developing the constellation—Paul Palcisco, director of production; and Chris Weber, vice president
- It took them six months to make their first 27 satellites
Summary
Amazon has been developing a constellation of satellites to deliver broadband Internet from low-Earth orbit for the better part of a decade, and the company is about ready to pull back the curtain. But until now, most people had to buy it from Elon Musk and SpaceX. In a wide-ranging interview this week with Badyal and two other senior Amazon officials developing the constellation—Paul Palcisco, director of production; and Chris Weber, vice president of business—Ars could learn that the Amazon Leo project is nearing several critical milestones. The team discussed the challenges that Amazon had to overcome to become the world’s second-largest satellite manufacturer (behind SpaceX), and reach the point where it can build a handful of satellites every day.