Starlink competitor ‘Project Kuiper’ rebrands as Amazon Leo

After several successful launches this year, Project Kuiper has its official name: Amazon Leo. It’s a reference to the term low Earth orbit (LEO), which refers to orbits at an altitude of 1,200 miles (2,000 kilometers) or lower. This is the region in which the Amazon constellation of 153 satellites orbits. The original codename refers to the Kuiper Belt, an asteroid belt located in the outer solar system beyond Neptune.

Amazon plans to launch more than 80 missions containing about 3,000 spacecraft. It was Leo Six launches so farincluding three launches using SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets carrying 72 satellites on board. Amazon’s main competitor in this space is SpaceX’s Starlink, which… It recently launched its 10,000th satellite.

Amazon promises that Leo will help “extend fast, reliable internet to those not reached by existing networks,” much as Starlink has tried to do over the past several years. Starlink (and Amazon) may be able to make this happen Under appropriate circumstancesAddressing the lack of good internet in many areas is an admirable goal. However, tens of thousands of satellites can be launched into orbit Present some key issuesSuch as the presence of an excessive amount of debris, increased risk of collisions in orbit, and increased danger to manned missions.