Among many emerging methods to connect rural communities across the globe and improve connection for first responders – particularly in remote and challenging terrains – is the use of satellite technology. 

The most recent echo amidst industrywide efforts was by SpaceX and T-Mobile US’s partnership, Starlink, to reportedly connect 500,000 square miles uncovered by a cellular network through phased array antennas.

In response to this announcement, Lynk president, co-founder, and CEO Charles Miller sat down with SDxCentral to discuss how the company has pioneered this model since 2017. 

With 15 commercial MNO contracts in 36 countries, Miller touts inventing the technology but believes that the recent Starlink partnership marked a significant step in validating the market. With six satellites currently in orbit, Lynk will begin providing the service by the end of the year. 

While the Starlink partnership is important for moving the work forward, Miller trusts his three decades in the space industry, where – as senior advisor for Commercial Space at NASA –  he saw “this small-satellite revolution was going to change everything” the way the personal computer did. 

“I knew this was huge, and nobody else did,” he said on a breakthrough of March of 2017, when he, Margo Deckard, and Tyghe Speidel founded Lynk. 

While championing cheap access to space and reusable launch vehicles in the 90’s, Miller recalled meeting with Musk. “I told Elon he should start a rocket company, and he looked at me and goes, ‘I have no interest in starting a rocket company.’” 

Miller noted nothing that Starlink plans to do isn’t already part of Lynk’s roadmap. “The difference between us and them is they said they think they can do it, and [they’ve] done it in the lab, and it's really hard. And we've done it already,” Miller explained.

While Lynk still has a pending FCC license to operate a set of satellites under smallsat rules, they have just secured their 15th contract with an operator in Africa. They have not released the name or exact location at this time. 

Of the 15 contracts, Lynk has publicly announced five including with Aliv [Bahamas], Telecel [Central African Republic], Unitel [Mongolia], bMobile [Solomon Islands], and Telikom Limited [Papua New Guinea].

Miller says the main challenge ahead is building out the network. “So we're at number six right now in orbit. And we're going to build the next phase – next year is 50… And then by 2025, we’ll build over 1000.”

Miller’s focus with the work lies in both bridging digital divide issues and providing connection to-and-between first responders and people in emergency situations. He warned of how “zero-G black spots” affect these situations, particularly in natural disaster scenarios taking place in remote, unconnected areas.

Furthermore, even in areas where there are connections, Miller says populations are in danger of losing emergency response communication when massive fires erupt because of how flammable power lines are, making it impossible to send emergency messages when they need to turn off power to stop the fires.

“A bunch of the politicians [are] saying well, we need to put huge battery packs at all the cell towers as backup power," he said. "You know what huge battery packs are sources of? Fire. You might cause a fire by doing that. So we have a solution to that.”