Alphabet is closing Loon, its division that provides internet from floating balloons, according to a post on Alphabet’s X moonshot division blog.
“The path to commercial viability has proven to be much longer and riskier than expected,” wrote Astro Teller, who heads X, on the blog. “In the coming months, we will begin to slow down operations and it will no longer be Another Bet within Alphabet.”
Alphabet, the parent company of Google, launched Loon in June 2013, and Loon “formed” from a moonshot for an independent company within Alphabet in 2018. Loon launched its first commercial Internet service in Kenya in July, composed of a fleet of about 35 balloons that covered an area of about 50,000 square kilometers. Loon also provided Internet services to areas affected by natural disasters, sending balloons to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017 and to Peru after an earthquake in 2019.
Teller says Loon is working to put employees in other roles at X, Google and Alphabet. “A small group of the Loon team will remain to ensure that Loon’s operations are completed smoothly and safely – this includes the termination of the Loon pilot service in Kenya,” according to Teller. The Loon service in Kenya will run until March, said an X spokesman The Verge. To support those in Kenya who may be affected by the loss of Loon’s service, Loon is pledging $ 10 million to support nonprofit organizations and businesses in Kenya dedicated to “connectivity, the Internet, entrepreneurship and education”.
Loon is not the only moonshot that Alphabet has shut down. It closed Makani, which aimed to use wind turbines attached to kites to generate renewable electricity last year. And the Foghorn Project, which researched how to create clean fuel from seawater, ended its work in 2016.