How Elon Musk's 'UFO On A Stick' Devices May Turn SpaceX Internet Subscribers Into The Starlink Satellite Network's Secret Weapon

Musk has said grabbing just 1-3% of the global telecommunications market through Starlink could pocket SpaceX tens of billions per year in revenue — much more than it may ever make launching rockets.

SpaceX founder Elon Musk. Dave Mosher/Insider

SpaceX can launch 60 roughly desk-size, 500-pound satellites at a time into space within the nosecone of its Falcon 9 rocket system.

SpaceX stuffed a fleet of 60 Starlink internet-providing satellites into the nosecone of a Falcon 9 rocket for launch in May 2019. Elon Musk/SpaceX via Twitter

Source: Business Insider

The internet is basically a series of connected computers, but how they're connected makes a significant difference. SpaceX's gambit with Starlink is made access faster and more widespread, yet less laggy and expensive than is provided by current internet service providers, or ISPs.

A router connecting multiple computers to the internet via cables. Associated Press

But fiber is fairly expensive and tedious to lay, especially between locations on opposite sides of the Earth.

Reeltender Mo Laussie watches fiber-optic cable as he helps install the cable unto telephone poles on June 21, 2001, in Louisville, CO. Michael Smith/Getty

Even within a country, achieving a direct wired path from one location to another is rare. Relying on ground cables also leaves many regions poorly connected.

Business Insider

Mobile services give us wireless access to the internet, but much of the core service depends on existing internet technologies, including fiber-optic cable networks.

A worker climbs on a cellular communication tower on March 6, 2014, in Oakland, California. Justin Sullivan/Getty

That's because cell towers require line-of-sight to pass by data wirelessly. Geography, cost, regulations, property rights, and other hurdles make it practically impossible to build enough towers to link together this way.

Shutterstock

Meanwhile, fiber-optic cables have a speed limit: Light moves through the vacuum of space about 47% faster than they can through solid-glass cabling.

A prism bends and splits up white light into a rainbow of colors because the speed of light is slower in glass than it is in air. Shutterstock

Source: Florida State University

This isn't an issue for normal browsing or streaming TV shows. But over international distances, it leads to high latency or lag. Handley said time delay is especially pronounced in long-distance video conferencing and voice calls made over the web.

The president speaks with children over a video conference. Carolyn Kaster/AP

Data beamed over existing satellites is some of the laggiest. That's because nearly all those spacecraft orbit from 22,236 miles (35,786 kilometers) up, where they can "float" above one location on Earth. That's enough distance to cause a more than half-second of lag.

An illustration of two different geostationary satellites, which orbit about 22,300 miles above Earth's surface. NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio; Business Insider

Source: University College London

Handley said that latency matters most to financial institutions. With markets that move billions of dollars in fractions of a second, any delay can lead to big losses over a competitor with a less laggy (and thus more up-to-date) connection to the web.

High-frequency-trading companies will try almost any new technology to learn about market changes before a competitor. Reuters / Brendan McDermid

Shuttling data around the world via satellite — and mostly through the vacuum of space, not glass — could cut that lag while also providing screaming-fast internet service almost anywhere on Earth.

An illustration of SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet constellation in orbit around Earth. SpaceX

Source: Business Insider

SpaceX deploys each flat-packed stack of 60 satellites at once, yet very slowly rotates it in microgravity. This causes the stack to spread out like "a deck of cards on a table," Musk said in 2019.

Source: Business Insider

From there, the satellites use Hall thrusters (or ion engines) to rise to an altitude of about 342 miles (550 kilometers). This is about 65 times closer to Earth than geostationary satellites — and that much less laggy.

A 13-kilowatt Hall thruster, or ion engine, being tested at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio. NASA

Starlink spacecraft are designed to link to four other satellites using laser beams. No other internet-providing satellites do this, Handley said, and it's what would make them special: They can beam data over Earth's surface at nearly the speed of light, bypassing the limitations of fiber-optics, cell towers, and other ISP technologies.

An illustration of Starlink, a fleet or constellation of internet-providing satellites designed by SpaceX. This image shows how each satellite connects to four others with laser beams. Mark Handley/University College London

Source: University College London

But for now, no Starlink satellites have lasers. Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX's president, and COO told reporters in October that laser links won't go on satellites until late 2020 at the soonest.

Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX's president, and COO, in 2017. Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images

Source: CNN

Until then, Musk says the company will link them via ground stations. A handful of sizable yet steerable antennas that can track satellites will be used to "talk" to the satellites.

Satellite tracking antennas in South Texas. Dave Mosher/Business Insider

There are also small user terminals for the customers to connect — the ones Musk he said look like "a UFO on a stick" or, previously, "a sort of a small- to medium-size pizza." (Though he or SpaceX has yet to show a picture of one.)

Rows of pizza boxes. Shutterstock

Source: FCC

That's small enough to add to a home. "There's also no reason one of these couldn't be flat and thin enough to put on the roof of a car," Handley said.

A Tesla Model Y electric car. Tesla

Musk said Starlink terminals would also easily fit on ships, airplanes, and other mobile devices, enabling these vehicles to have better broadband connections than what's available today.

NAN728/Shutterstock

Musk said just 1,000 satellites are required "for the system to be economically viable." He noted that's "obviously a lot of satellites, but it's way less than 10,000 or 12,000."

A computer scientist's rendering of SpaceX's constellation of satellites for Starlink: a scheme to provide global, high-speed, low-latency internet service. Mark Handley/University College London

But according to SpaceX's FCC filings, the company expects to operate 1 million ground stations. Handley thinks the small terminals will not just download and upload one user's data but also act as critical nodes before the laser links are ready — turning customers into a kind of global mesh network.

A computer scientist's rendering of SpaceX's constellation of satellites for Starlink: a scheme to provide global, high-speed, low-latency internet service. Mark Handley/University College London

Source: FCC

Handley and others previously assumed SpaceX would only use lasers because they took the most direct (and fastest) path through space. But Handley's new analysis of Starlink's network suggests turning customers into relays would make the network even faster and more resilient.

An illustration of Starlink, a fleet or constellation of internet-providing satellites designed by SpaceX. This image shows the shortest path in the network between New York and London. Mark Handley/University College London

Without lasers, data could get to and from computers around the world through Starlink by bouncing from satellite to a user terminal, then to another satellite within view, and so on in a zig-zag daisy-chain at the speed of light.

A computer scientist's rendering of SpaceX's constellation of satellites for Starlink: a scheme to provide global, high-speed, low-latency internet service. Mark Handley/University College London

Handley calculated this would significantly beat the lag of the current internet, and even a hypothetical one made entirely of uninterrupted fiber-optic cable.

Source: Mark Handley/University College London

Customer terminals also solved a problem Handley previously saw with planned laser links: Due to the arrangement of the satellites in space, some connections — like London to Johannesburg — had to go out of their way, causing them to be slower than fiber-optic cables.

A computer scientist's rendering of SpaceX's constellation of satellites for Starlink: a scheme to provide global, high-speed, low-latency internet service. Mark Handley/University College London

Source: Mark Handley/University College London

Mixing both the laser links and user terminals, though, provided the fastest of any solution to shuttle internet data to and from a location.

A computer scientist's rendering of SpaceX's constellation of satellites for Starlink: a scheme to provide global, high-speed, low-latency internet service. Mark Handley/University College London

Source: Mark Handley/University College London

One hurdle SpaceX needs to overcome before laser links are available: Oceans. Though ground stations strategically placed on islands could close the gap, Handley suspects terminals attached to ships would still be needed.

Source: Mark Handley/University College London

But even Handley doesn't see too much of a problem. "Ships aren't cheap, but they're cheaper than rockets. So this is probably doable," he said in his video.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches Starlink at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, May 23, 2019. US Air Force/1st Lt Alex Preisser

Source: Mark Handley/University College London

It might be even cheaper for SpaceX to put ground stations close to fiber-optic cables and use them to bridge the divide, at least until laser links become available.

TeleGeography

In any case, data sent over Starlink won't magically know which path it should take; SpaceX will have to constantly calculate the locations of all its satellites and ground stations. But Handley said he was able to compute that in negligible with his personal computer "with a few devious tricks inspired by how game engines work."

A computer scientist's rendering of SpaceX's constellation of satellites for Starlink: a scheme to provide global, high-speed, low-latency internet service. Mark Handley/University College London

Source: Mark Handley/University College London

Watch Handley's complete speculative explanation about how Starlink might work below.