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Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

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Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#41

Post by [deleted] »

compounding_it wrote: post #6
ge96 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon seems to have a service for everything, one time I saw they had satellite ground station as a service

I think America in general is moving to a service based economy where you don’t own anything anymore. Everything from cars (lease) to homes (rentals) to electronics to insurance etc comes at a monthly cost. This kind of model works when the central government is trusted (or at least perceived to be trusted) to keep the wheel churning. I think the current government took some of the power back from big tech and people…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#42

Post by philipwhiuk »

spondyl wrote: post #26

Oh, I missed the memo that Amazon Leo is the new name for Project Kuiper, rebranded in November of last year. I saw a presentation back when it was Kuiper so have still been calling it that

Leo is a dumb name. I still call it Kuiper.

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#43

Post by philipwhiuk »

bigfatkitten wrote: post #11
piokoch wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why space data centers? What advantage this would have? Cooling will be a big issue, while it is easily solved on the planet earth, as we have water, air that can transfer heat away.

They don’t have any advantages at all. People point to the cost of land, but if being physically inaccessible isn’t a problem, then there are lots of cheap places on Earth you can deploy data centres too at far lower cost than launching them into orbit.

For now there's a regulatory oversight advantage (or rather lack of same).

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#44

Post by philipwhiuk »

iso1631 wrote: post #18
bigfatkitten wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don’t have any advantages at all. People point to the cost of land, but if being physically inaccessible isn’t a problem, then there are lots of cheap places on Earth you can deploy data centres too at far lower cost than launching them into orbit.

Desert land is free. Floating data centres in the middle of the pacific is free. If a state, or even rich billionaire, wanted to take out your data centre in low earth orbit, it's only a few million dollars to launch a retrograde rocket which explodes into 10 ton of shrapnel, or even less to forget the orbit and just launch it directly up.

You can do the same to the ones in the Pacific and desert too.

It's a declaration of war much the same.

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#45

Post by nutjob2 »

Ekaros wrote: post #23

I wonder if there will become a point where these companies will be considered too big and will be forcibly cut up to smaller chunks... If feels like they have tentacles in everything now.

There is no such thing as a company being "too big", it's only a question of market power (eg monopolies) and abuse of that power.

For LEO data it seems that there will be plenty of competition. If you're talking about Amazon, they're in fiercely competitive markets. Them having the capital and cash flow ('size') to launch a competitor to SpazX is only a good thing.

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#46

Post by sublinear »

iso1631 wrote: post #28
sublinear wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Defense systems in space need to be... in space. I don't think people are looking at this the right way. They need to be inaccessible to terrestrial and air weapons, have lower latency, not be dependent on power plants, etc.

Far easier for someone like Iran or China or the US to take out an LEO satellite than an underground data centre, or even a surface on in the case of DCs in US or China.

It's also pretty easy to launch another one into orbit to replace it? I'm not sure I understand what you mean. We can have all these options simultaneously. The easiest targets are where the faster paced more offensive action is going to be.

People have been talking about waging war in space for many decades now. All the arguments for and against it were made a very long time ago, and it was decided it's a hell of a lot better that way. Even a nuclear blast in orbit is more tolerable.

Space superiority is just too damn appealing as the next frontier after land, air, and sea where we've been stuck in stalemate for a while. It's perfectly natural we go to space for this, including the datacenters.

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#47

Post by chiph »

supernova87a wrote: post #38

I remain convinced that the main successful business model in the satellite communications industry is to wait for the first incarnation of the satellite company to fail / go bankrupt / flounder, and then be part of the 2nd round of financing or ownership that comes in to buy it out and operate it... I don't know why this is the pattern but it seems to have played out several times over the last 2 decades that I've c…

If you haven't read Eccentric Orbits: The Iridium Story you should. The system was operational, but Motorola's dysfunction and impossible sales goals leading to disillusionment meant that Dan Colussy & team was able to pick it up for $25 million (development price: $5 billion)

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#48

Post by vjvjvjvjghv »

supernova87a wrote: post #38

I remain convinced that the main successful business model in the satellite communications industry is to wait for the first incarnation of the satellite company to fail / go bankrupt / flounder, and then be part of the 2nd round of financing or ownership that comes in to buy it out and operate it... I don't know why this is the pattern but it seems to have played out several times over the last 2 decades that I've c…

Or also owning a rocket company that launches your satellites at low cost.

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#49

Post by everfrustrated »

philipwhiuk wrote: post #42
spondyl wrote: post #26

Oh, I missed the memo that Amazon Leo is the new name for Project Kuiper, rebranded in November of last year. I saw a presentation back when it was Kuiper so have still been calling it that

Leo is a dumb name. I still call it Kuiper.

Helps to think of it less as lion and more of an orbit.

Re: Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network

#50

Post by vjvjvjvjghv »

compounding_it wrote: post #6
ge96 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon seems to have a service for everything, one time I saw they had satellite ground station as a service

I think America in general is moving to a service based economy where you don’t own anything anymore. Everything from cars (lease) to homes (rentals) to electronics to insurance etc comes at a monthly cost. This kind of model works when the central government is trusted (or at least perceived to be trusted) to keep the wheel churning. I think the current government took some of the power back from big tech and people…

At some point government and companies will be merging into one.
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