Vodafone To Use Amazon's Satellites To Bring 5G To Africa, Europe

Vodafone Group Plc VOD inked a deal with Amazon.com, Inc.'s AMZN low Earth orbit satellite constellation Project Kuiper to extend the reach of 4G/5G services to more of their customers in Europe and Africa.

The British telecom operator and its South African unit Vodacom will leverage Project Kuiper's high-bandwidth, low-latency satellite network to bring the benefits of 4G/5G connectivity to remote areas. 

Project Kuiper will connect geographically dispersed cellular antennas back to the companies' core telecom networks. The focus areas are where traditional fiber or microwave solutions are challenging and prohibitively expensive to serve.

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As Amazon's production satellites come online, the companies will begin deploying services in Africa and Europe. 

Amazon is readying to test two prototype satellites in the coming months before deploying production satellites in 2024. 

Amazon expects to begin beta testing Project Kuiper services with select customers by the end of 2024.

"Collaborating with Project Kuiper gives us an exciting new path to scale our efforts, using Amazon's satellite constellation to quickly reach more customers across the African continent," said Shameel Joosub, CEO of Vodacom Group. 

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Price Action: VOD shares were trading lower by 0.2% to $9.29 at last check Tuesday, while AMZN shares were down 1.27% to $136.37. 

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