Australia's top telecommunications company Telstra Group announced on Monday that it will partner with Elon Musk-owned company Starlink in an effort to provide the country with fixed broadband and much improve voice services.
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People look at the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying 21 second-generation Starlink satellites from Space Launch Complex 40 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, in Cocoa Beach, Florida, on February 27, 2023.
Partnering with Starlink
Telstra announced that it will be partnering with a huge corporation outside Australia, Accordion to the released statement from the company, Telstra signed the deal to use Elon Musk's low-Earth orbit-satellite constellation called Starlink, providing a much better experience when it comes to broadband and voice services for every Australians in the country.
The agreement between the two companies will be providing connectivity options for business customers, bringing mobile connectivity in areas without fixed. The business offer of the company will be available to purchase from Telstra both locally and in select countries overseas.
Currently, Telstra only uses a mix of technologies to provide a better experience for voice and broadband services in both rural and remote areas of Australia. This will include NBN fixed broadband, mobile networks, and older copper radio networks available.
Through this partnership, Starlink will provide an additional connectivity option for people and businesses in rural and remote locations where signals are hard to reach, making it difficult to provide quality connectivity with existing terrestrial networks.
Better Connection to Rural Areas
Starlink stated through the proximity of these satellites, will reduce latency which makes them a great and more consistent option for services where low latency is needed, such as voice and video calls.
"We truly believe in improving connectivity for all Australians, regardless of where you live work and play. Adding LEO satellites as an option both for customers and to bolster our connectivity options in regional areas brings us a big leap closer to closing this digital divide," the company added.
This is all possible because of the LEO satellites that are much close than the geostationary satellites to Earth and multiple satellites as part of the constellation, allowing them to send and receive signals much faster.
Based on a report from Reuters, Starlink is a company from the United States, operated by founder and Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk. While Telstra expects to be able to offer the new service options for both customers and businesses in the country by the end of the year, the company promised to offer higher download speeds compared to copper-based Asummetrcic Digital Subscriber Lines.
Also Read: Telstra Outage: Australians Struggle to Make Phone Calls
Starlink constellation is the only alternative to NBN's Sky Muster satellites, which Australians have for satellite internet. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Sky Muster uses a very high Earth orbit with 36,000 kilometers. This means it will only have two satellites to achieve wide coverage. However, speeds are low while latency is high.
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