OneWeb sends up 36 broadband internet satellites

OneWeb has put up another 36 satellites, taking its in-orbit constellation to 146 spacecraft.

The new platforms were lofted by a Soyuz rocket from Russia’s far east.

The additions will enable engineers to further test the company’s promised system for delivering broadband internet connections from space.

OneWeb is now owned principally by the Indian conglomerate Bharti Global and the UK government after they bought the enterprise out of bankruptcy last year.

The new management anticipates offering a commercial service this autumn to northern latitudes – including Britain, Northern Europe, Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Iceland, and Arctic Seas – with a full global roll-out of connectivity in mid-2022.

“We have what we call ‘five to 50’ (degrees latitude). So, that’s five launches we need to do in order to get to this coverage of basically the south coast of the UK to the North Pole,” explained chief executive Neil Masterson.

“By the end of June we will have completed those launches to enable us to be providing our service. But in total this year, we expect to be doing somewhere between eight and 10 launches,” he told BBC News.