Ministers in talks with Elon Musk’s Starlink in rural broadband push

Starlink satellites over Devon

Credit: Cover Images

Logo: Better broadband

The Government has held talks with Elon Musk’s satellite network Starlink over accelerating the UK’s rural broadband deployment.

Digital Minister Matt Warman met with Mr Musk’s company last week, The Telegraph understands, amid a push to use emerging technology as part of  the £5bn “Project Gigabit” plan to connect the hardest to reach parts of Britain to fast broadband.

Satellite broadband, high-altitude balloons and autonomous drones could all also be part of Britain’s future broadband mix to reach the most remote 100,000 UK homes, according to a new consultation.

It comes as the Government unveiled the first tranche of areas to be targeted for state subsidies for fibre and one gigabit per second broadband.

Some of the first areas to benefit will include “Red Wall” seats that voted Tory at the last election. The first wave will include 510,000 homes in areas including Labour seat Hartlepool, which faces a key by-election, as well as Stockton, Redcar and Penzance in Cornwall.

After a tender process, the first work is expected in the first half of 2022.

As well as using fibre optics, the Government will consult on using wireless broadband from new sources. 

Oliver Dowden, the Culture Secretary, writes in today’s Telegraph: “We are launching a call for evidence to explore the most experimental and innovative solutions to this problem – whether it’s using low earth orbit satellites to connect a cottage in the highlands, or streaming broadband from high-altitude balloons hovering over the hardest-to-reach locations, we are ruling nothing out. 

“Our consultation will help determine which of these ideas are feasible, and which aren’t.”

The areas in Britain with the slowest broadband

Last year, the Government bought a £400m stake in satellite broadband company OneWeb, which is understood to have held talks with BT about offering its internet service through the telecoms company. 

Mr Musk’s Starlink, part of SpaceX, has already launched more than 1,300 small, low orbit satellites that have started providing broadband to parts of the UK. OneWeb has launched 110 satellites and plans for a total of 600. Others such as Eutelsat are expanding their satellite coverage.

Last week, Starlink emailed trial customers that its offering, which starts at £89 per month, would be expanding to cover remote parts of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Users have reported speeds in excess of 100mbps.

Exploring the use of balloons and drones to delivery broadband would follow similar efforts by tech giants including Google and Facebook. 

Google set up Project Loon, a company using balloons in the stratosphere to deliver internet connections. Facebook ran Project Aquila, a solar-powered drone aimed at delivering data to remote areas. 

Both projects were ultimately mothballed.