Verizon and AT&T perform direct video calls with direct cocks with direct spacemobile

The US mobile operators Verizon and AT&T both worked with AST spacemobiles to attract video calls for direct attention.

The two operators announced the attempts with AST Spacemobile separately, which used the five -Low -focus -satellites (Low Earth Orbit) of the company.

The Bluebird satellites from AST were started in September.

The video calls come weeks after the AST spacemobile with Vodafone to make a similar call in the UK.

ASt received special temporary authority from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) last month to test its satellite broadband network in the USA.

In order to carry out the test video calls, the 850 MHz spectrum of AT&T and Verizon, which is compatible with standard smartphones, used.

AT&T found that AST initiated the video call from Midland, Texas, at AT&T in Dallas, Texas. Verizon did not state any details about locations.

“This breakthrough marks a new era in cellular -to -satellite connectivity in the USA, which enables seamless data transmissions -not only texts -in the rare example, a terrestrial mobile network is not available,” said Hans Vestberg, Chairman and CEO of Verizon.

“Add this level of skills – not only to write to someone, but also to be able to send calls, to send video chat or files – be it in the wilderness or in a remote part of a sea community, only the reliability of our customers' connectivity and communication experience will improve.”

Bluewalker 1 was founded in 2017, the company's first test satellite, and was launched in 2019. Bluewalker 2 was canceled. The latest test satellite, BlueWalker 3, was introduced in 2022.

Ast planned a constellation of almost 170 satellites; The first 20 were originally supposed to enter the operation by 2023, with a further 90 to 2024 being used. According to recent press releases, it seems to revise its constellation plans to 100.

Verizon and AT&T as well as Vodafone are all investors in AST Spacemobile and compete by Elon Musk's SpaceX Starlink.

This week, too, AST received a contract of 43 million US dollars to support the United States Space Development Agency (SDA) as part of the company's plans to build its Leo constellation.

Eutelsats 5G NTN experiment

Elsewhere this week, the Eutelsat Group, MediaTek and Airbus Defense and Space combined to use the first successful 5G test with 5G satellite system from Eutelsat OneSat OneWeb Low-Earth orbit (Low Earth Orbit) (NTN).

According to the Eutelsat, the tests underline the potential of the 5G -NTN standard, which could lead to future satellites and terrestrial interoperability within a large ecosystem, which reduces the costs of access and the use of satellite widths for 5G devices around the world are enabled.

The test used Eutelsat OneWeb satellites and the Mediatek No. NTN test chipset, while Sharp and Rhode & Schwarz provided the antenna and the test equipment and the satellites built by Airbus with the connection.

A 5G device that is connected to the network via satellite and has successfully replaced the data.

“5G NTN will be an essential feature of the Iris constellation. We are proud to be the first satellite operator to show the 5G Air interface in a commercial fleet in KU band and avoid the way for new applications in future constellations,” said Arlen Kassihghian, Chief Engineering Officer of the Eutelsat Group.