Samsung proposes 'space internet' of 4,600 orbital satellites for global, cheap web access

Too many people, not enough bandwidth as Samsung looks to the heavens for worldwide internet provision

Samsung has put forward plans for a "space internet", consisting of 4,600 low earth orbit (LEO) micro-satellites with a capacity of one zetabyte per month of data for the entire planet.

The system, it adds, would scale to terabits-per-second data rates for "ground-based local area and wide-area wireless access, wireless backhaul, and for access via unmanned aerial vehicles and satellites".

The proposal comes in the form of a research paper attributed to Farooq Khan, self-appointed "world's leading authority on mobile technology" as well as "inventor, author and speaker". He is also president of Samsung Research America.

The satellites would be launched at a range between 160km and 2,000km from the Earth's surface, and the number of 4,600 is - argues Khan - extremely important for consistent functionality and coverage - an "entire constellation" to "maintain constant coverage where a new satellite shows up at the location of a previous satellite which has moved out of sight," argues Khan.

He says the entire scheme is necessary as "demand for data increases 10 times every five years and will continue to increase at this pace with an expected 1,000-times increase in the next 15 years".

Comparing this phenomena to Moore's law, Khan points out that global mobile traffic has already passed an exabyte per month, and can be expected to reach 10 exabytes per month by 2018.

By 2028, he adds, "both cellular and Wi-Fi will be carrying data traffic in excess of one zetabye/month".

In order to meet these bandwidth demands and "to connect the remaining two-thirds of humanity that currently does not have access to the internet", says Khan, "we will need to complement cellular and Wi-Fi networks with satellites and other aerial systems".

Samsung is not the only company to propose a "space internet", with Google having already put forward similar ideas involving satellites and even balloons.