Vodafone has completed the first video call on satellite using a normal 4G/5G smartphone, in partnership with AST Spacesmobile. The call came from a remote place in Wales-which had never had a high-speed cell connectivity before-and Vodafone engineer Rowan Chasmer and Vodafone Group Margarita Dela Valla was among the CEO.
It is symbolic, in January 1985, exactly 40 years after Britain’s first mobile call. Technology has progressed a lot since then and AST claims that space has “first and only” mobile broadband network that regularly works with 4G and 5G smartphones (ie without special satellite connectivity hardware which only something There are phones).
Wait, what about T-Mobile Starlink-to-Ope-SAL service in America? This only carries the texts for now, although mobile data has been planned as a service in the future.
The AST Spacesmobile is located in Texas and currently the orbit has five satellites, they are blued 1 through 5. These satellites connect with Vodafone Ground stations to provide massive access to Vodafone’s network and internet. You can see such a station in the video below – and, of course, such a station takes it all to cover all of the UK.
This is not just a video call, Vodafone and AST are claiming many achievements. Esty Spasmobile founder, president, and CEO Abel Avalon said: “This historic milestone is another important step in our partnership with Vodafone, a long -time investor and a major technology partner in AST Spacesmobile. Together, we have earlier achieved many worlds in space-based broadband connectivity, including first space-based voice calls, first 4G download speed over 10 Mbps and 5G voice calls for the first time. This latest achievement using our blued satellites is a step close to our mission to eliminate connectivity intervals and make cellular broadband accessible to all. ,
The satellites are actually capable of extreme transmission speed of up to 120Mbps. The target is plugging any gap in coverage in remote rural areas and “vast segments of the surrounding sea”.
Vodafone will be doing further tests in this spring. The plan is to start rolling satellite-based direct-to-phone broadband service for users in Europe at the end of this year and at the end of 2026.
AST and Vodafone are closely connected, by the way, the carrier became a major investor in AST Spacesmobile in 2019. But Vodafone is not the only carrier working with AST – the company has participated in Bell in Canada, in the US with AT&T and Verizon. And Rakutane in Japan.
You can see the first space-based video call made with a normal cellphone below. It also shows the ground station described above and how this system works in slightly more detail.
