A major revolution in the Greek telecommunications market is coming in early 2021 by American tycoon Elon Musk.
According to SpaceX, an aerospace manufacturer from Musk and a space transport services company, “fast satellite Internet will be brought to everyone in Greece, and coverage of all Greek territories by SpaceX’s Starlink program satellites should be completed in first quarter of 2021. ”
The executives of the SpaceX and Starlink Projects are already in contact with the National Telecommunications and Postal Commission of Greece, as well as with the Greek Digital Government Ministry, in order to obtain the necessary licensing and start the process of replacing the old Internet providers. .
This major shift in Greek telecommunications is also important for scientists, engineers, computer programmers and many other professionals in Greece, as many promising new opportunities for working with SpaceX are arriving in the country.
SpaceX, NASA’s largest aircraft supplier and partner, reports that “Starlink’s entry into the Internet connection services market is likely to shock the Greek telecommunications market, and although we expect it to be slightly more expensive – estimated at around 20% more expensive than current Internet providers – it will provide 100% coverage of Greek territory and will bring speeds that reach 150 Mbps. “
What does Internet Mbps speed mean?
The current Internet speed in Greece varies between 5 and 50 Mbps (Megabits per second), with 15 Mbps being the average Internet speed per household in the country. This specifically means that Internet users with this speed in Mbps can enjoy various online activities that, combined, reach up to 50 Mbps.
For example, playing online games (10 Mbps), watching YouTube videos (5 Mbps), sending Facebook messages on another device (5 Mbps) and downloading a movie (10 Mbps), all together would require at least 30 Mbps, for that browsers are working at a fast pace, pages are loading quickly, and all Internet activity runs smoothly.
The 150 Mbps SpaceX satellite Internet – the fastest in the telecommunications market – would allow Greek internet users to enjoy multiple online activities at the same time, from multiple devices, with extremely fast downloads and speeds of online games, the highest quality 4K and 3D videos and more.
Given that most of the country remains ‘hostage’ to outdated and therefore low-speed infrastructure, even in Athens, the impact of SpaceX’s latest internet technology will be great for communications in Greece and the way companies operate.
Elon Musk’s move to bring Starlink to Greece will place the country at the top of the list of countries with the fastest internet in the world, alongside South Korea (which ranks first), followed by Norway, Singapore and Canada , while the US holds 11º position, the UK the 14ºand Australia, 43rd position. Greece currently holds 54º place on the list of countries with the fastest internet in the world.
SpaceX to provide satellite dishes to users in Greece – similar to satellite TVs – which will allow them to connect to Starlink satellites in space.
Then, in turn, the Starlink satellites will connect to an earth station in Greece, which will provide internet to the entire country. These ground stations, which are technically the backbone of the global Internet and can be found in several countries around the world, must be located in Nemea or Thermopylae, Greece.
There are currently more than 800 Starlink satellites in orbit, all serving the US and Canada, with several European countries, including Greece, about to join SpaceX’s satellite Internet in 2021.
More precisely, Starlink is a satellite system built by SpaceX to provide satellite internet and high-speed broadband services. The entire SpaceX system consists of thousands of small satellites in low orbit, which work in combination with terrestrial transceivers (ground stations).
The development of Starlink began in 2015, with the first two test satellites being launched in orbit in February 2018.
A second pair of test satellites was sent into space in 2019, and the first massive satellite launch took place in May 2019, where 60 operational satellites were placed in orbit at the same time. SpaceX’s plans, designs and development of the Starlink project took about 10 years and cost more than $ 10 billion.
Since the beginning of 2020, SpaceX has been able to send 60 satellites into space at a time, and is planning to build a total of 1,584 satellites to provide global internet by the end of 2022.
In 2020, it was reported by ELSTAT that eight out of ten households in Greece have Internet access from home (80.4%), which shows a significant increase compared to 2010, where 73.3% of households used Internet.
That number is expected to grow by 2025 and cover the vast majority of remote villages and rural areas in Greece.
It has also been reported that there are at least two laptop / desktop devices and three to four smartphones on average in a Greek home. These numbers place Greece among the top 50 countries with the highest access to the Internet and among the top 30 countries with the most devices that can be connected to the Internet by residence.
Elon Musk, founder of SpaceX and Tesla Motors, is one of many business tycoons who decided to start new projects in Greece in 2020, following Microsoft and Pfizer, among other major corporations.
SpaceX claims that the Starlink satellite Internet in Greece will reach the highest possible connection speeds at the moment, which are more than three times faster than the maximum Internet speeds provided by existing providers in many areas of Greece, even in Greece. Rile up.
The Starlink team is currently in the process of building the necessary infrastructure in Greece, as well as fiber optics and satellite receiving stations on the ground, with plans to launch the new satellite internet in the country by April 2021.
Spotify boss Daniel Ek will invest € 1 billion in European startups