A Google Project Loon internet balloon is seen at the Google I/O 2016
developers conference in Mountain View, California on May 19, 2016.PHOTO
| REUTERS
Alphabet Inc’s Loon said on Thursday it would deploy its system
of balloons to beam high-speed Internet access with Telkom Kenya from
next year to cover rural and suburban populations, marking its first
commercial deal in Africa.
Known as Project Loon, the
technology was developed by Alphabet’s X, the company’s innovation lab.
It has since become Loon, a subsidiary of Alphabet, which is the parent
company of Google.
The technology was used by US
telecom operators to provide connectivity to more than 250,000 people in
Puerto Rico after a hurricane last year.
Kenya hopes the technology can help achieve full Internet coverage of its population.
“Loon’s
mission is to connect people everywhere by inventing and integrating
audacious technologies,” said Alastair Westgarth, the chief executive of
Loon.
Telkom Kenya is the third biggest operator in the country behind market leader Safaricom and Bharti Airtel’s Kenyan unit.
“We will work very hard with Loon, to deliver the first
commercial mobile service, as quickly as possible, using Loon’s
balloon-powered Internet in Africa,” said Aldo Mareuse, the chief
executive of Telkom.
The terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The
Loon service uses balloons, which are powered by an on-board solar
panel, to provide fourth generation (4G) coverage to areas with lower
population densities.
They float at 60,000 feet above the sea level, well above air traffic, wildlife, and weather events, Loon said.
With
more than 45 million people, Kenya’s major cities and towns are covered
by operator networks, but vast swathes of rural Kenya are not covered.
A
Microsoft-backed Kenyan start-up has been using under-utilised
television frequencies to connect some of those rural communities.
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