According on the latest Speedtest® Global Index report from internet analysis firm Ookla, the Philippines ranks as having 5th fastest internet in Southeast Asia. Could you believe that? Yes, the internet connectivity in our country is having great progress over the years.
Before we get so deep into this, just so you know, there are four different types of residential internet connections in the Philippines; the mobile connection or the cellular data, the dial up, the Digital Subscriber Line or the DSL and the Fiber Optic.
Now, having said that, let’s enumerate the “Providers” in our country, you’ll be surprised how many they are really:
· PLDT Home
· One Sky
· Converge
· Globe at Home
· Eastern Communications
· Cheetah Broadband
· Kabayan Broadband
· StreamTech
· Integranet
· Net1
· Red Powered by Cignal
· Royal Cable
DITO Telecommunications have the promise to be of great competition and provide wide access of the Internet, well, that’s probably another story.
What we’ll be talking about here is the Starlink, which the Billionaire Elon Musk’s company SpaceX has announced last February (2023) that it will be available here in the Philippines.
Starlink is a Satellite internet constellation operated by Spacex, providing satellite Internet access coverage to a lot of countries around the world. It provides satellite-based internet connectivity to underserved areas of the planet, as well as competitively priced service in more urbanized areas. In August 2022 SpaceX lowered monthly service costs for users in select countries. For example, users in Brazil and Chile saw monthly fee decreases of about 50%.
As of December 2022, Starlink has over one million active subscribers. In February 2023 it was reported that Starlink had 95,000 subscribers in Australia alone.
Starlink operates on a satellite internet service technology that has existed for decades. Instead of using cable technology, such as fiber optics to transmit internet data, a satellite system uses radio signals through the vacuum of space. Ground stations broadcast signals to satellites in orbits, which in turn relay the data back to the Starlink users on Earth. Each satellite in the Starlink constellation weighs 573 pounds and has a flat body. One SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket can fit up to 60 satellites.
The goal of Starlink is to create a low latency network in space that facilitates edge computing on Earth. The challenge of creating a global network in outer space isn't a small one, especially because low latency is an important demand. SpaceX has proposed a constellation of almost 42,000 tablet-size satellites circling the globe in low orbit to meet this demand. The CubeSats -- miniature satellites commonly used in LEO -- create tight network coverage, and their low Earth orbit produces low latency.
Starlink offers unlimited high-speed data through an array of small satellites that deliver up to 150 Megabits per second (Mbps) of internet speed. SpaceX plans to double this rate in the coming months.
According to a recent Speedtest by Ookla, Starlink recorded its fastest median download speed in the first quarter of 2022 at 160 Mbps in Lithuania. Starlink also clocked in at 91 Mbps in the U.S., 97 Mbps in Canada and 124 Mbps in Australia. Starlink in Mexico was the fastest satellite internet in North America, with a median download speed of 105.91 Mbps. The Speedtest further revealed that upload speeds have seen a downward curve of at least 33% in the U.S. -- from 16.29 Mbps in the first quarter of 2021 to 9.33 Mbps in the second quarter of 2022.
The Department of Information and Communications Technology or DICT here in the Philippines have agreed with Elon Musk's SpaceX to launch the Starlink Philippines. Elon Musk’s SpaceX tweeted, in Tagalog, our local dialect here in the Philippines, on 22nd of February, 2023 that its satellite internet service, Starlink, is now live in the country.
Accessing the Internet using a satellite? Well it might be really fast, but it will not come cheap. Keeping our fingers crossed, let’s hope these prices will drop soon enough. As of this writing, early days of March 2023, Starlink will charge you as follows:
Starlink Enterprise KIT
- PHP 176,176.00 (starter kit plus taxes)
- PHP 3,824.00 (Data Lake and local handling fees)
- PHP 21,600.00 (VAT)
- TOTAL: PHP 201,600.00
- Php 644,376.99 (starter kit plus taxes)
- Php 5,624.00 (Data Lake and local handling fees)
- Php 78,000.00 (VAT)
- TOTAL: Php 728,000.00
Let’s just hope that the DICT will attract some competition to make those prices more affordable.
Cheerio!
