According to the Toronto Star, Ontario-based Galaxy Broadband announced plans to team up with the United Kingdom’s OneWeb in a new $50 million partnership. Galaxy is a distribution partner of OneWeb’s low-Earth orbit connectivity solutions.
The multi-year contract will try to place Galaxy in direct competition with SpaceX’s Starlink, and the service is already starting to roll out in Nunavut, according to CEO and founder Rick Hodgkinson.
“Right now, we are 100 percent focused on Nunavut because they’re in desperate need,” said Hodgkinson to The Star. “Access to broadband internet is an essential service that supports education, health care, commerce and general well-being.”
“There are numerous communities throughout Canada that do not have access to broadband internet, with the challenge in Nunavut being particularly acute as the Territory is 100 percent dependent on satellite connectivity services,” Hodgkinson added.
SpaceX Starlink Latency Spikes Frustrating Some Customers https://t.co/Fr0uIpYk9k
— TeslaNorth.com (@RealTeslaNorth) January 22, 2023
Galaxy is shooting to have all 25 of the Nunavut communities connected by the end of 2023, and the company already has hubs in 75 remote locations throughout Canada. Each of these sites connects between 30 and 800 users.
The broadband internet service from Galaxy is expected to be more affordable than Starlink’s expensive hardware, and it will offer at least 50 Mbps in downloads and 10 Mbps for uploads, “if not more,” according to Hodgkinson.
A recent study by Ookla showed Starlink saw median download speeds of 65.80 Mbps in Canada in Q3 2022. The Advantage of Starlink is the fact SpaceX can launch its own satellites constantly, as the company did this morning.
But it doesn’t appear SpaceX views OneWeb as a threat, as Elon Musk’s company launched 40 OneWeb satellites for the company last month from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. OneWeb now has 542 satellites in its constellation, whereas SpaceX has 3,583 satellites in operational orbit, according to astronomer Jonathan McDowell.
“We are thrilled to be expanding our work with Galaxy, delivering on our mission to provide high-speed, low-latency service to more rural and remote areas where connectivity is long overdue. With decades of experience successfully connecting Canadians, Galaxy is one of OneWeb’s first partners and we are proud of the service we have been able to deliver together across Canada,” said Neil Masterson, CEO of OneWeb in a statement.
The Galaxy broadband will also use existing infrastructure for satellite internet to provide internet to a wider base of people, rather than individual households.
In November, SpaceX announced that its Starlink internet began reaching previously untouched areas of Canada and other remote northern locations.
