If all goes well, Bluewalker 3 will launch a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket this August.
AST SpaceMobile This week confirms plans to launch its BlueWalker 3 satellite from Cape Canaveral, Florida this week, August 15, 2022. BlueWalker 3 is designed to test cellular broadband connectivity directly with standard mobile phones, says AST SpaceMobile.
The company announced in May that the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) had exempted AST Spacemobile from testing satellites. The FCC license allows AST SpaceMobile to test satellites, although the FCC has not yet given the company a commercial operating license as a carrier.
The experimental license will allow AST SpaceMobile to test BlueWalker 3 satellite-to-phone connections in the United States on sites in Texas and Hawaii. Once the satellite is launched, the team plans to test it on 5 different continents. AST SpaceMobile is working with operators including Vodafone, Rakuten Mobile and Orange, it said.
AST expects software and network core testing and optimization to be performed while the satellite is in operation. The company says it has invested about $ 85 million to reach this point and has conducted more than 800 ground tests with satellites.
If something works with BlueWalker 3, the next step in AST is to build and deploy a network of satellites called BlueBirds. The business says it could make up to six a month at its Texas manufacturing facility.
For AST SpaceMobile Abel Avelan, it’s about tackling the ever-expanding digital divide. He describes “digital as having ‘and’ not having ‘”.
“This revolutionary technology supports our goal of closing the connectivity gaps and coverage of more than 5 billion mobile subscribers today and bringing cellular broadband to almost half the world’s population who remain unconnected,” he said.
AST has paid for a payload berth in the spacemobile SpaceX-powered Falcon 9, which is scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral that week. Of course, the actual launch date is subject to change. And the company warns that there are still factors over which it has no control, such as launch conditions.
AST SpaceMobile secured a berth before the BlueWalker 3 on a Soyuz mission. But it was canceled after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russian space agency Roscosmos has announced plans to halt all Soyuz launches due to sanctions imposed by the European Union (EU) in February. In March, AST SpaceMobile announced a multi-launch agreement with SpaceX. This has helped the company secure a structure to follow not only the BlueWalker 3, but also large enough production Bluebird satellites.
AST SpaceMobile is one of several companies working on non-terrestrial network (NTN) telecommunications solutions. NTN solutions include low earth orbit (LEO), geostationary earth orbit (GEO) and satellites operating on high altitude platforms (HAPS) such as balloons or drones.
