September 7, 2020 - No. 067 In This Issue Russia Looks To Join The Supersonic Flight 2.0 Race Turkish aviation giant TAI doubles R&D spending Airlines are removing seats to make space for gadgets and seafood ACTS rebrands as MB Aerospace Taoyuan Rocket Lab Receives a Five-Year Launch Operator License from FAA Drone Carries Freight To Offshore Oil Platform The pandemic will bring about the end of cattle class flights Bain Capital's purchase of Virgin Australia wins creditors' approval Amazon Prime Air gets FAA approval for drone deliveries Covid-19: UK plans to introduce airport testing SpaceX Starlink 'space lasers' successfully tested in orbit for the first time Russia Looks To Join The Supersonic Flight 2.0 Race The Russian Federation is looking to create a supersonic passenger aircraft research center to join the new race for a supersonic commercial aircraft. Now, with the help of a grant from the federal government, the aim will be to establish a world-class scientific center capable of designing a low-sonic boom aircraft. Creating the plane would also involve the study of material strength, acoustics, vibrations, emissions, fuel efficiency, and the use of artificial intelligence. Spearheading the new initiative is the Moscow-based Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute, who, during the study, is expected to obtain breakthroughs in new aircraft technology. Cockpit augmented-reality technology Things already being talked about include new innovative designs that can cut down on noise. There is also talk of using augmented-reality technology on the flight deck. In charge of overseeing the project will be the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, an organization that was founded by President Vladimir Putin in 2018. When speaking about the project's goals, aviation website FlightGlobal quotes Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute director-general Kirill Sypalo as saying, "Within the framework of this project, we plan to work out the fundamental problems of future supersonic aviation." The 49-year-old Moscow Aviation Institute graduate discussed how the institute had established a group of companies, including high profile names like the GosNIIAS aviation systems center and the Gromov flight-test center. Along with these two big names in Russian aerospace is the Baranov aircraft engine institute. The government will spend $204 million Sypalo says that the new science center would look at the viability of supersonic flight while at the same time what environmental impact it would have on the planet. Under the mandated government funding, 60 applications were received looking to get a slice of the Rb15.5 billion ($205 million) that will be spread over the next four years. The research into supersonic passenger flight came under the field titled intelligent transport systems. Others included robotics, healthcare, energy efficiency, social studies, and agriculture. The idea of Russia wanting to have another look at supersonic passenger planes is not that far fetched and something President Vladimir Putin talked about while visiting Kazan earlier this year. The new plane's idea would be based on the Tu-160 strategic bomber, the largest and heaviest Mach 2 supersonic military aircraft ever built. The state-controlled international television network, Russia Today, quotes the president as saying, "We now need to go back to supersonic passenger travel. We should think about it." When speaking about a civilian version of the Tu-160, Putin added, "Everything is running like clockwork, so why not also create a supersonic passenger plane?" The Tu-44 was too costly This isn't the first time Putin talked about building a supersonic passenger plane, having commented on it last year after watching a test flight of the new updated Tu-160. Following the flight, he mentioned Russia's supersonic Tu-144 passenger plane, saying it was too costly at the time. He said the economic situation in Russia now is different and that there are Russian companies capable of operating a Russian-built supersonic commercial aircraft. https://simpleflying.com/russia-supersonic-flight/ Back to Top Turkish aviation giant TAI doubles R&D spending Turkey's leading aerospace company Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) doubled its research and development (R&D) investments last year, spending TL 3 billion ($402 million). According to a statement by the company, TAI's R&D spending has displayed a sustained growth trend in recent years, which continued in 2019. The company monitors innovative technologies and integrates them into its products to reach a sustainable competitive advantage on a global scale. It has taken solid steps toward becoming a pioneering organization that influences the aviation and space fields, the statement added. While TAI allocated TL 1.5 billion to R&D in 2018, it doubled this amount in 2019, spending TL 3 billion for R&D and innovation projects. With these numbers, 34.4% of 2019's turnover was allocated to R&D expenditures. In addition to the R&D investments, TAI continues to train human resources in technoparks that would fulfill the demands of the defense industry. It has also carried out activities to strengthen university-industry cooperation. The company employed 150 new personnel during the first sixth months of this year despite the coronavirus pandemic, reaching a total of 3,000 employees. TAI was established in June 1973 under the auspices of the Ministry of Industry and Technology to reduce dependence on foreign sources in the country's defense industry. TAI acts as Turkey's technology center in the areas of design, development, modernization, production, integration and life cycle support processes of integrated aerospace industry systems, including fixed and rotary-wing air platforms, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and space systems. https://www.dailysabah.com/business/defense/turkish-aviation-giant-tai-doubles-rd-spending Back to Top Airlines are removing seats to make space for gadgets and seafood Cargo, one of the least glamorous aspects of flying, is proving a rare ray of light for airlines amid the coronavirus gloom. The grounding of passenger planes at a time of increased demand for everything from medical supplies to iPhones has boosted freight rates. With much of the world's population house-bound and shopping online instead of hitting the malls, analysts see no let-up in demand, particularly as the peak year-end holiday season approaches. "Airfreight is going to be a bright spot for carriers at least for this year because while borders are closed that doesn't mean people aren't buying," said Um Kyung-a, an airline analyst at Shinyoung Securities in Seoul, South Korea. "That trend is likely to continue as cargo capacity remains limited." The sort of goods moving along this global conveyor belt 30,000 feet in the sky also track the pandemic's unfurling. Masks and gloves have given way to semiconductor chips and PC parts as consumers set up work-from-home arrangements. Fresh produce is also big as people venture out less. Ultimately, once a vaccine is found, airlines will be used to disperse billions of vials quickly and in a temperature-controlled environment. Under normal circumstances, about 60% of air cargo globally is flown in the belly hold of passenger flights. With hundreds of those jets parked in deserts waiting out the pandemic, airfreight costs have spiraled: Rates to North America from Hong Kong are up almost 70% from early January. For Australia's Qantas Airways, medical freight out of China hit a peak in May and June. "What we saw were huge uplifts of light but very bulky freight - masks and gowns and gloves and the like. That was when we started to see airlines put light, fluffy boxes into passenger cabins," said Nick McGlynn, who oversees Qantas's freight sales and network as the unit's chief customer officer. That's now subsided and Qantas has since been flying fresh produce from Australia into Asia including "significant amounts" of tuna to Japan and coral trout to Hong Kong, he said. On routes back to Australia, it's dominated by medical supplies, car parts and electronics, as well as components for Caterpillar mining equipment from the U.S. Fiji Airways is making a little extra from carrying seafood and kava, CEO Andre Viljoen said during a presentation last week. Bloomberg Intelligence predicts belly capacity from passenger air fleets won't return to pre-pandemic levels before 2022. Not every airline is able to pivot to address the changed circumstances. But those that can haven't wasted any time. Cargo-only In the U.S., United Airlines recently operated its 5,000th cargo-only flight (the busiest air cargo routes are between Asia and North America.) The carrier's revenue from cargo jumped more than 36% in the second quarter to $402 million. American Airlines, meanwhile, has relaunched cargo-only services after a 35-year hiat us. In September, it expects to operate more than 1,000 cargo-only wide-body flights, primarily Boeing 777s and 787s, to 32 destinations in Latin America, Europe and Asia. In Asia, Singapore Airlines' budget long-haul arm Scoot last month removed the passenger seats from one of its Airbus A320s to free up more space, while Korean Air Lines, which is also converting planes, and Asiana Airlines eked out quarterly profits after flying jets loaded with technology components to sate consumer demand for at-home gadgets. Emirates, the world's fourth-biggest cargo carrier after Federal Express, Qatar Airways and United Parcel Service, said it "reacted very quickly," scaling up its cargo network to around 50 destinations by early April, 75 by mid-May and 100 by the start of July. "We've been able to connect more than 115 destinations with cargo capacity on a scheduled basis," said Emirates' Divisional Senior Vice President of Cargo, Nabil Sultan. "We worked round the clock to use not only our freighter fleet, but also our passenger aircraft for cargo flights." That's not to say there isn't an enormous amount of pain in global aviation. Airlines are hemorrhaging cash and laying off tens of thousands of staff. While the cargo operations of Deutsche Lufthansa contributed a record 299 million euros ($354 million) to the group's operating profit in the second quarter, and the operating margin of the airline's cargo arm was a robust 39%, the wider Lufthansa group suffered a massive 1.7 billion euro operating loss in the three-month period. Still, in such a tough environment, every bit counts. Indonesia's Lion Air is even hauling basic necessities like non-perishable foodstuffs by plane across its vast archipelago. "Canned foods, things you'd normally buy on your grocery trip, are being air flown because this is a more efficient way to have them delivered across the country," Managing Director Daniel Putut said. "With passengers falling sharply, we have to find other revenue means." Qatar Airways, one of the world's heavyweights in freight, doesn't see cargo rates coming down for at least 12 months. "The world is a village and air cargo is the main street," said Guillaume Halleux, Qatar's chief cargo officer. "Airlines in general have become the lifeline for the world, and airlines with strong strategies and agility have been able to sustain themselves most easily." https://www.unionleader.com/news/health/coronavirus/airlines-are-removing-seats-to-make-space-for-gadgets-and-seafood/article_e2ed3d5e-d708-5202-8d68-a11d7b0a51ae.html Back to Top ACTS rebrands as MB Aerospace Taoyuan Aero engine repair company ACTS is celebrating a quarter-century of growth and rebranding as MB Aerospace Taoyuan. Founded in 1995 as a joint venture by Pratt & Whitney, China Airlines and Singapore Airlines Engineering Company, ACTS was acquired by MB Aerospace in January 2018 and underwent a major expansion last year, doubling its footprint across two state-of-the-art facilities close to the logistics hub of Taipei Taoyuan International Airport. Over the last 15 years it has expanded to provide its technology and services to a global customer base of aero-engine OEMs, world leading airline MROs and an extensive network of brokers. The business now employs over 130 specialist and technical staff and is a leading provider of aero-engine component repair services to a range of industry leaders including Pratt & Whitney's overhaul network, General Electric, Rolls-Royce, MTU, SRT, MHI, Korean Air, Delta Airlines and many others across the world. Unveiling the new brand, Craig Gallagher, MB Aerospace CEO, said "the strong performance of the business is based to a huge degree on the skill and dedication of the entire team locally, underpinned by the support of Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs. The rebranding to MB Aerospace Taoyuan is a mark of our firm commitment to further expansion and a tangible sign of the operation's importance to the wider MB Aerospace group. Since acquisition, we have invested heavily to expand our capacity and capabilities. The second facility became operational in 2019 and enabled us to develop existing in-house capabilities alongside newly developed auto welding and surface treatment, attracting new customers far earlier than we had originally planned. The entire workforce has an exemplary customer-first focus, developed in conjunction with a continuous improvement ethos, delivering fast turnaround times and flawless quality component repairs. We have very high ambitions for the operation and have further plans to grow our capability to serve existing and new customers on both legacy and new generation products." Karl Fessenden, MB Aerospace president and chief operating officer, said "people and customers are at the heart of the culture of (the company). The relentless drive to continuously improve and provide enhanced service levels to all customers gives us an excellent position to build a great future. The embedded lean culture and ability to successfully develop new repairs using capable processes along with continued investment in our people, capacity and capability readies us to meet future market needs." Johnson Hsu, general manager, said "reflecting on the past quarter of a century, we are rightly proud of what we have achieved, but remain fiercely ambitious. It has been my privilege to be with the company since the very beginning, working with great people and customers across the world. I have seen the business grow from having only five repairs to now where we have significant bank of repair capability covering a wide range of component types on many aero engine models and the rebranding to MB Aerospace Taoyuan is a fitting way to mark this achievement." https://asianaviation.com/acts-rebrands-as-mb-aerospace-taoyuan/ Back to Top Rocket Lab Receives a Five-Year Launch Operator License from FAA Rocket Lab, the private aerospace company behind the Electron launch vehicle, has received a five-year Launch Operator License from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The FAA Launch Operator License was granted to the company for its Electron missions to be conducted in its Rocket Lab Launch Complex 2, located on Wallops Island, Virginia. Rocket Lab's new five-year accreditation allows the company to conduct multiple launches from the Virginia site. The company will no longer need to file and request for individual licenses for each and every mission they will conduct, streamlining their processes toward sending satellites. Ahead of NASA's Artemis Mission Rocket Lab attaining the FAA Launch Operator License is a huge administrative milestone for the California-based aerospace company. Its future Electron projects will reportedly include a NASA lunar orbit mission in support of the Artemis program - the NASA mission to send humans back to the Moon and later, to Mars. The Electron launch vehicle and its Photon satellite, both platforms developed by the Rocket Lab, will be used in the upcoming Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment (CAPSTONE). This experimental mission will launch Electron and Photon to the same NRHO, or near rectilinear halo orbit, that will be used in the future project called Lunar Gateway - a joint project between different space agencies to establish a multi-purpose facility at lunar orbit. CAPSTONE will validate the navigation techniques and test the dynamics involved in this halo-shaped orbit. The data from this mission will guide the next spaceflight missions to the Moon and beyond. "Having FAA Launch Operator Licenses for missions from both Rocket Lab launch complexes enables us to provide rapid, responsive launch capability for small satellite operators," said Peter Beck, founder, and CEO of Rocket Labs, in a press release. "With 14 missions already launched from LC-1, Electron is well established as the reliable, flight-proven vehicle of choice for small sat missions spanning national security, science, and exploration." Peter Beck added: "With our upcoming missions from Launch Complex 2, we're ushering in an era of even more flexibility and launch availability for these important government missions." Rocket Lab Facilities and Recent Milestones According to their press release The Rocket Lab Launch Complex 2, is mainly designed to offer the company's technologies and launch capabilities to US government missions. The company's other launch facility, the Launch Complex 1, is located at the Mahia Peninsula in New Zealand. The company recently launched the first satellite that is mostly developed, built, and launched from the South Pacific nation. On August 31, it carried a payload for a client - the American space company Capella Space - to be carried into Earth orbit. Capella Space's Earth-imaging satellite, named Sequoia, in the mission named "I Can't Believe It's Not Optical." However, the company only revealed the details of the recent mission's secret payload. Aside from the Sequoia satellite, the Electron vehicle also carried Rocket Lab's own satellite, named "First Light." Shortly after the Sequoia was launched, the Electron engaged its Kick Stage - launching the 50-kilogram First Light into space. https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/27196/20200907/rocket-lab-receives-five-year-launch-operator-license-faa.htm Back to Top Drone Carries Freight To Offshore Oil Platform A Camcopter S-100 drone made the first commercial drone delivery to an offshore oil platform in late August and it might be the beginning of a major industry. The helicopter drone flew a 3-D printed part from Norway to a rig located about 60 miles off the coast. The flight was conducted without any special airspace adjustments and the drone was just part of the traffic servicing the oil fields. The drone also did an exterior inspection of the drilling platform and performed a simulated search and rescue drill with the rig's standby vessel. Of course, the oil companies are keeping a close eye on the drone developments because hauling freight and supplies to the rigs by drone could not only be a lot cheaper, but also safer. There are also several major helicopter companies that have oilfield supply as their core business watching the new initiatives. Servicing oil platforms is a multibillion-dollar business and also one of the most dangerous forms of commercial flying. Nordic Unmanned, which flew the first drone flight, says drones are a viable alternative to many missions now flown by big, expensive helicopters. "This marks the beginning of a new chapter within unmanned logistics," spokesman Pål Kristensen said. "The technology is proven and robust enough to implement in large scale and reduces the risk cost and environmental footprint drastically." https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/drone-carries-freight-to-offshore-oil-platform/ Back to Top The pandemic will bring about the end of cattle class flights The last flight taken by Scott Solombrino, chief executive of the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA), was on March 13. It was a trip back to Boston, Massachusetts from Europe, where he'd been attempting to allay the concerns of the travel industry facing what had just been recognised as a global pandemic. Pre-coronavirus, passengers travelling for business accounted for one in every eight seats filled on a plane, but airlines relied on them for 75 per cent of their profits. As people started working from home, flights were grounded and airlines approached governments for financial support. In April, three-quarters of businesses responding to a GBTA poll said they had cancelled all international travel, and half said they had cancelled all domestic trips. Three in ten workplaces expect it to take more than a year for business travel to resume. But when it does, it won't return to normal. "We'll be much more conscientious about how we travel," says Solombrino. He hopes that new rules for travelling - possibly including masks, gloves and temperature checks, as well as social distancing - will get the industry going again. Properly social distancing while flying would be near-impossible: to keep a two-metre distance between passengers, only the window seats on either side of a single-aisled plane could be occupied - on every third row. That would result in a load factor, or passenger density, of 15 per cent, well below the 86 per cent industry average pre-coronavirus. According to the International Air Transport Association, only four airlines worldwide can make money when a flight's load factor is less than 62 per cent. Airports would struggle too: Heathrow's chief executive has said it would be impossible to physically distance at security checks or gates. Extra checks would extend the amount of time required to make connecting flights to far-flung destinations, which travel data company OAG says could reduce current flight connectivity by up to a fifth. That's before considering the effects of quarantine measures introduced by governments, which would make short business trips impractical. The travel industry is caught in a Catch-22 situation: the measures they need to introduce are too stringent to make much travel feasible - but not implementing them could put people off flying altogether. All of which makes some question whether the idea of frequent business travel might not become a relic of the past. "You have so many technologies that let you see people eyeball to eyeball: why do we need planes?" says Cary Cooper, professor of organisational psychology at Manchester Business School. He believes up to 90 per cent of business travel could disappear, with meetings held instead through webcams. Some sectors, like the oil and gas industry, will still need workers to fly out to rigs and other work sites, but Cooper forecasts that a whole sector of executive travel will disappear. "For a long time people will be suspicious about being in aircraft, then they'll realise they can do what they have to do in real time with technology," he says. But John Strickland, an aviation analyst, is not convinced that habits will change for the long-term. He draws comparisons with September 11, 2001, when the aviation industry faced a similarly catastrophic collapse. It took three years for passenger numbers to return to pre-9/11 levels. Video conferencing tech has improved since then, as has the availability of broadband connections to support it, but "in many cases you can't beat face-to-face meetings," he says. Meanwhile, we may travel smarter and less frequently. Business travel could capture some of the exclusivity of the past in premium cabins, where people can stretch out and socially distance. "One of the only ways of giving the personal reassurance to travellers, as well as people feeling that they don't want to put their employees at risk, could be buying a business class ticket," says Strickland. That would be good news for the industry: though premium cabins are usually home to one in every 20 passengers, they give airlines 30 per cent of their revenue. https://www.wired.co.uk/article/future-of-business-travel Back to Top Bain Capital's purchase of Virgin Australia wins creditors' approval US private equity company Bain Capital has won creditors' approval for the purchase of airline Virgin Australia. In April, Virgin Australia Group's board of directors appointed Deloitte's Vaughan Strawbridge, John Greig, Sal Algeri and Richard Hughes as voluntary administrators. On 26 June, the administrators signed a binding agreement for the sale of the business to Bain Capital. The sale was to occur by the execution of deeds of company arrangement (DOCAs) and shares transfer of Virgin Australia Holdings (VAH) to Bain Capital. The binding agreement also said the sale can occur by asset sale agreement, involving the business and assets transfer into a new corporate structure and placing the existing companies into liquidation. The administrators have now confirmed that creditors accepted ten DOCAs. These cover all 41 of the entities in voluntary administration. The signing and completion of the DOCAs will take place within 15 business days from 4 September. Once signed, an application will be submitted for shares transfer of VAH to Bain Capital. The transfer is subjected to approval by the Federal Court and is expected to be completed by 31 October. The deal provides unsecured creditors with a return between $0.13 and $0.09 on their claims. It will support continued employment for most of the employees, as well as retention of aircraft and equipment. Strawbridge said: "While the outcome of the meeting today is a significant milestone for both the future of Virgin Australia and Australia's aviation industry more broadly, we also acknowledge those loyal Virgin Australia Group employees who will lose their jobs and the difficulties that this will cause them and their families, as well as the numerous suppliers and investors who will not receive all of the monies owed to them." https://www.aerospace-technology.com/news/bain-capital-virgin-australia-approval/ Back to Top Amazon Prime Air gets FAA approval for drone deliveries Amazon just got one step closer to sending flying robots to your front door with that much-needed package of diapers. The Federal Aviation Administration officially designated the e-commerce colossus an "air carrier" on Monday, paving the way for Amazon to start testing its plans to drop off packages within 30 minutes. The FAA's approval marks a huge milestone for Amazon's CEO Jeff Bezos grand plans to dominate online shopping by dramatically reducing delivery times. Last year, the shopping behemoth announced that it would start testing a shift from two-day shipping to one-day shipping for Prime customers. The drones, Amazon says, could allow it to reduce shipping times to mere minutes once a customer hits the "buy" button. "This certification is an important step forward for Prime Air and indicates the FAA's confidence in Amazon's operating and safety procedures for an autonomous drone delivery service that will one day deliver packages to our customers around the world," Prime Air vice president David Carbon said in a statement. The company will "work closely with the FAA and other regulators around the world to realize our vision of 30-minute delivery," he added. Amazon said it plans to use its newly acquired "air carrier certificate" to start testing customer deliveries with drones. The company's drone deliveries, which are still in the development stage, are expected to be limited to packages under 5 pounds. he Seattle-based company made its first successful drone delivery on December 7, 2016 when it dropped off a Fire TV stick and a bag of popcorn to a home in Cambridge, England. The trip took 13 minutes, according to Amazon's Prime Air website. But regular commercial service has failed to take off due to the enormous regulatory hurdles Amazon faces - many of which have yet to be cleared, according to Bloomberg. For Amazon to effectively rely on drones for regular deliveries, it must be able to pre-program the drone's routes and let them fly without human pilots watching their every move, but US regulations don't currently allow for completely autonomous flights, Bloomberg reported. The FAA would also have to develop a new air-traffic system to track low-altitude drone flights, as well as come up with rules to minimize the risk of drones striking other aircraft and disturbing human activity below. None of that has stopped Silicon Valley from betting on drones as a way to speed up commerce. Indeed, Amazon is the third company to win FAA approval to carry packages on drones that fly beyond the operator's line of sight. The agency has also awarded certificates to UPS's "Flight Forward" service and Wing, a subsidiary of Google-parent Alphabet that's started testing drone deliveries in Virginia. The FAA's approval comes as Amazon sees its business surge due to the coronavirus pandemic, which has forced more people to shop from the safety of their own homes - sending the stock and Bezos' fortune soaring. Amazon shares closed up 1.45 percent at $3,450.96 - a rise of 86 percent this year. Last week, Bezos became the world's first $200 billionaire on the skyrocketing stock price. https://kyrnews.com/technology/16116/amazon-prime-air-gets-faa-approval-for-drone-deliveries/ Back to Top Covid-19: UK plans to introduce airport testing The UK is reportedly planning to introduce an in-airport Covid-19 testing arrangement amid increasing pressures from airlines and travel companies to scrap the current quarantine rules. According to a Financial Times report, the UK Government is assessing the feasibility of moving to a system where passengers will be tested for Covid-19 when they arrive at British airports. The move may reduce the need for passengers to remain in self-isolation from 14 days to a minimum of seven. Under the new system, passengers will be tested twice, once they land and again a week later. If the results of both tests are negative, they can break their quarantine after seven days. UK Transport Secretary Grant Shapps told Sky News: "You probably have to have some kind of quarantine period here, perhaps seven or eight days, maybe a test then. But these are the things we're working through at the moment." However, Shapps did not provide a time frame for the introduction of the new testing regime. This comes after UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson endorsed the current quarantine system as the airport system will not be effective in identifying all virus cases. The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has significantly impacted the global aviation industry, with revenues anticipated to shrink by 60% compared to the projected baseline (pre-Covid-19 forecast for 2020). To support the recovery of the sector, the airline industry has called for an airport testing regime, which, if not negative, will reduce the need of a 14-day quarantine period. https://www.airport-technology.com/news/covid-19-uk-airport-testing/ Back to Top SpaceX Starlink 'space lasers' successfully tested in orbit for the first time SpaceX has revealed the first successful test of Starlink satellite 'space lasers' in orbit, a significant step along the path to an upgraded "Version 2" constellation. In simple terms, those "lasers" are a form of optical (light-based) communication with an extremely high bandwidth ceiling, potentially permitting the wireless, high-speed transfer of vast quantities of data over equally vast distances. Of the ~715 Starlink satellites SpaceX has launched over the last 16 months, some 650 are operational Version 1 (v1.0) spacecraft designed to serve a limited group of customers in the early stages of the constellation. Prior to SpaceX's September 3rd announcement, it was assumed that none of those satellites included laser interlinks, but now we know that two spacecraft - presumably launched as part of Starlink-9 or -10 in August - have successfully tested prototype lasers in orbit. Ever since CEO Elon Musk first revealed SpaceX's satellite internet ambitions in early 2015, those plans have included some form of interconnection between some or all of the thousands of satellites the company would need to launch. While a functional low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet constellation doesn't intrinsically need to have that capability to function or be successful, inter-satellite links offer some major benefits in return for the added spacecraft complexity and cost. The single biggest draw of laser interlinks is arguably the major reduction in connection latency (ping) they can enable compared to a similar network without it. By moving a great deal of the work of networking into orbit, the data transported on an interlinked satellite network would theoretically require much less routing to reach an end-user, physically shortening the distance that data has to travel. The speed of light (300,000 kilometers per second) may be immense but even on the small scale of the planet Earth, with the added inefficiencies inherent in even the best fiber optic cables, routing data to and from opposite ends of the planet can still be slowed down by high latency. Without interlinks, Starlink and internet constellations like it function by acting more like a go-between for individual users and fixed ground stations that then connect those users to the rest of the Internet. Under that regime, the performance of constellations is inherently filtered through the Earth's existing internet infrastructure and is necessitates the installation of ground stations relatively close to network users. If a satellite without interlinks can 'see' (and thus communicate with) customers but can't 'see' a ground station from the same orbital vantage point, it is physically incapable of connecting those communications with the rest of the internet. This isn't a showstopper. As SpaceX's very early Starlink constellation has already demonstrated through beta testers, the network is already capable of serving individual users 100 megabits per second (Mbps) of bandwidth with latency roughly comparable to average wired connections. The result: internet service that is largely the same as (if not slightly worse and less convenient than) existing fiber options. To fully realize a LEO internet constellation's potential of being much better than fiber, high-performance laser interlinks are thus a necessity. With laser interlinks, the aforementioned connection dropout scenario would be close to impossible. In the event that an active satellite finds itself serving customers without a ground station in reach, it would route those forlorn data packages by laser to a different satellite with immediate ground station access. One step better, with enough optimization, user communications can be routed by laser to and from the ground stations physically closest to the user and their traffic destination. With a free-floating network of satellites communication in vacuum along straight lines, nothing short of a direct, straight fiber line could compete with the resulting latency and routing efficiency. Interlinks offer one last significant benefit: by sacrificing latency, an interlinked network will be able to service a larger geographic area by allowing the connections of users far from ground stations to be routed through other satellites to the nearest ground station. Large-scale ground station installation and the international maze of permitting it requires can take an inordinate amount of time and resources for nascent satellite communications constellations SpaceX's fully-interlinked Starlink Version 2 constellation is targeting latency as low as 8 milliseconds and hopes to raise the bandwidth limit of individual connections to a gigabit or more. As soon as a viable Starlink v2.0 satellite design has been finalized and tested in orbit, SpaceX will likely end v1.0 production and launches, entering the second phase of iteration after the v0.9 to v1.0 jump. https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starlink-space-lasers-first-orbital-test/ Curt Lewis