First of all, my comment was in response to a flippant comment "Oh Starlinks gonna win." In that context its more information than the original commenter gave along with their 1-bit opinion.
Oh yeah and I also interviewed with Loon.
Iridium solved the satellite interlink problem (but only wirelessly at 10 Mbps). They could have used laser crosslinks but they didn't know how to implement a search / sync up algorithm (fast sub-second search algorithms were available before iridium was built but they failed to take advantage of the MIT research.)
The basic problem is that Iridium / Globalstar / Loon / Starlink are all fill-in systems for terrestrial internet. And since we've been deploying terrestrial internet for 25Y, the number of places missing higher-speed internet is smaller and smaller each year. All the rich customers have all been reached by faster, cheaper wires. The poor customers ... well they are poor, they will not pay much for service. And there are fewer of them every year ...
No LEO system can actually penetrate a building with a data signal. It's a physics problem with sending a signal 400 mi wirelessly. Reusable rockets don't solve that physics / power problem. Iridium has a special +35dbm channel that can ring a phone inside a building, but you have to walk outside (in the rain, snow, whatever) to take the call. Same with starlink. Physics hasn't changed since the mid 1990s. It is not expected to change in the next billion years, either.
So its just not a smart thing to build satellite internet. period.
Oh yeah and I also interviewed with Loon.
Iridium solved the satellite interlink problem (but only wirelessly at 10 Mbps). They could have used laser crosslinks but they didn't know how to implement a search / sync up algorithm (fast sub-second search algorithms were available before iridium was built but they failed to take advantage of the MIT research.)
The basic problem is that Iridium / Globalstar / Loon / Starlink are all fill-in systems for terrestrial internet. And since we've been deploying terrestrial internet for 25Y, the number of places missing higher-speed internet is smaller and smaller each year. All the rich customers have all been reached by faster, cheaper wires. The poor customers ... well they are poor, they will not pay much for service. And there are fewer of them every year ...
No LEO system can actually penetrate a building with a data signal. It's a physics problem with sending a signal 400 mi wirelessly. Reusable rockets don't solve that physics / power problem. Iridium has a special +35dbm channel that can ring a phone inside a building, but you have to walk outside (in the rain, snow, whatever) to take the call. Same with starlink. Physics hasn't changed since the mid 1990s. It is not expected to change in the next billion years, either.
So its just not a smart thing to build satellite internet. period.