Vodafone has entered into a strategic collaboration with Project Kuiper, Amazon’s low earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation, to extend the reach of its 4G and 5G services in Europe and Africa.
Vodafone and Vodacom are planning on using Project Kuiper’s high-bandwidth, low-latency satellite network to connect mobile antennas in remote locations with the companies’ core networks. This will allow both Vodafone and Vodacom to provide 4G/5G services in multiple locations without the spending time or expenditure on building fibre-based or fixed wireless links back to the core networks. Amazon will test two prototype satellites in the coming months before proceeding to deploy production satellites in 2024.
With Amazon expecting to start beta testing Project Kuiper services with select customers towards the end of 2024, Vodafone and Vodacom will also participate in the same through the collaboration. The collaboration is expected to provide mobile connectivity to many of the estimated 40 per cent of the global population without internet access, hence supporting remote communities, schools and businesses, emergency services and disaster relief.
