Abstract
Full, superfast broadband could be just round the corner for everyone on the planet, thanks to swarms of small satellites. Despite all the advances that technology has brought about, there is a digital divide around the globe: those with connectivity and those without. Space-based internet is set to resolve this problem. Low Earth Orbit (LEO) space is filling up with satellite constellations that aim, when complete, to give total broadband internet coverage around the world. StarLink, which is a division of Elon Musk's SpaceX, claims that both speed and latency could be at least equivalent to those currently experienced by superfast fibre optics - around 1Gbit/s and 10ns respectively, although a signal will always have to go from Earth to the satellite constellation and back down again, so reaching this latency target is going to be a challenge for the space-based systems.
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