The Google concept of providing rural cellular connectivity from specially designed balloons, dubbed Project Loon, could be tested on the vast Indian subcontinent, according to reports.
According to The Economic Times, Google is having discussions with multiple service providers in India, including BSNL, about piloting Project Loon using licensed spectrum.
While he didn’t name BSNL, Rajan Anandan, managing director of Southeast Asia and India for Google, commented on the viability of Project Loon in an exclusive interview with The Economic Times.
“To me Loon works — but at a simplistic level, it is infrastructure in the sky,” Anandan said. “And we’ll partner with a local telco. Because the actual provisioning of the service is done by a local telco. So, we’re talking to a number of local telcos. We can’t do a Loon pilot without partnering with a local telco. We are talking to a number of them. The government has been very supportive — we are working on a pilot and we are working our way through it. In India, the important thing is to do is work through things.”
Project Loon, in partnership with service providers Indosat, Telkomsel and XL Axiata, plans to begin testing delivery of LTE access via balloons floating over Indonesia this year. Project Loon VP Mike Cassidy in a corporate blog post said only one in three Indonesians are connected to the Internet.
“And even though most of their connections are painfully slow, they’re doing some pretty incredible things,” Cassidy noted. “Startups like motorcycle delivery service Go-Jek are building impressive adaptations to Indonesia’s unique challenges, while small businesses like fashionable hijab shop Hijup are using the Web to redefine marketplaces. Still, a majority of Indonesians don’t have access to the educational, cultural and economic opportunities of the Internet. That’s why we’re pleased to announce that Indonesia’s top three mobile network operators – Indosat, Telkomsel and XL Axiata – have agreed to begin testing Project Loon balloon-powered Internet over Indonesia in 2016. These tests represent an important step toward bringing all of Indonesia online.”
Cassidy wrote the ultimate goal is to provide LTE Internet to 100 million unconnected people in Indonesia.
Rural connectivity is also something tech giant Facebook has taken a keen interest in via its Free Basics, which was launched in India, but forced by regulators to be shutdown for violation of net neutrality principles. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg took to the social networking site to comment on a company project that’s developing “solar-powered planes for beaming down Internet connectivity.” Coupled with the company’s research into artificial intelligence, the goal is to use AI to analyze satellite images.
“Many people live in remote communities and accurate data on where people live doesn’t always exist,” Zuckerberg wrote. “We can’t beam Internet connectivity to people if we don’t know where communities are, so we built AI technology to analyze 15.6 billion satellite images to create much more accurate population maps across 21.6 million square kilometers of Earth. We will share these maps openly with the community so other organizations can use them too. This should help with planning energy, health and transport infrastructure, as well as assisting people who need help in disasters.”
