'Amazon acquires Facebook's satellite Internet team'

SAN FRANCISCO: Tech giant Amazon has acquired a team of more than a dozen wireless Internet experts from Facebook to boost its multibillion-dollar project of launching thousands of satellites and offer broadband service globally, reports The Information.

The report, citing a Facebook spokesperson, said on Wednesday that the social networking giant's employees "moved to Amazon in April to help the company develop its network of low-orbit satellites by the middle of this decade". The workers are in the Los Angeles area and included physicists as well as optical, prototyping, mechanical and software engineers who had previously worked on aeronautical systems and wireless networks, according to their LinkedIn pages. Amazon paid Facebook an undisclosed sum as part of the acquisition, which saw more than a dozen Los Angeles-based employees switch companies in April to work on Project Kuiper, the report said. According to The Verge, the move brings an end to Facebook's efforts to deliver Internet connectivity to remote areas via its satellites.

When it confirmed the initiative in 2018 the company said that it believed the technology would make it possible "to bring broadband connectivity to rural regions where internet connectivity is lacking or non-existent". (IANS)

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