📶 Japan’s airborne solar 5G antennas will connect remote areas

Happy New Year! Japan is already looking ahead to 2025, with plans to pursue an ambitious strategy to deploy unmanned aerial vehicles offering wide-range 5G connectivity next year. Called high altitude platform stations (HAPS), these solar-powered pseudo-satellites could overcome ground infrastructure challenges that have slowed internet adoption, especially in remote regions.

While rival China accelerates terrestrial 5G build-out globally, much of Africa lacks coverage, with only 24 percent of people online. Enter HAPS - with a 200-kilometer coverage radius that could enable universal access through fleets of floating cellular nodes.

Japan recently secured international spectrum rights to enable its stratospheric vision. And with tests already proving feasibility, the country appears determined to reassert its leadership in telecommunications by providing universal coverage from the edge of space. Jump to today’s Must Read to learn more about the tech that will make this possible.

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Buoyed by newly allotted international radio frequencies, Japan is moving ahead with a plan to deploy fleets of solar-powered high altitude platform stations (HAPS) by 2025.

These stratospheric pseudo-satellites could provide wide 5G coverage to remote areas that are otherwise lacking in cellular infrastructure. One soaring base station with a 200 km range could replace numerous ground-based towers. With HAPS demos already proven and standard frequency bands now secured globally, Japan is poised to connect more of the world’s most inaccessible areas.

Click below for an artist’s impression of the futuristic flying base station, and learn more about this plan to accelerate the rollout of global broadband.

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