Astro Teller, left, and Larry Page. Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images; Justin Sullivan/Getty Images; Loon/Alphabet; Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images; Samantha Lee/Insider This story is available exclusively to Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now.
In January, Alphabet announced it would shutter its internet balloon business, Loon.
It followed years of inflating costs and geopolitical headaches for the team.
Meanwhile, the company tried to conjure new ways to make money from cruise liners, offshore oil rigs, and more.
For years, images of Loon s stratospheric balloons could be spotted throughout Google s campuses. Employees pitching to advertising clients would sometimes slip in a picture or mention of the project in their otherwise dull, statistic-heavy decks. Occasionally, a balloon could be spotted drifting across the presentation welcoming new employees to the company.
Google’s Loon failure raised an awkward question
FILE PHOTO: A Google Project Loon internet balloon is seen at the Google I/O 2016 developers conference in Mountain View, California.
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. Updated: 07 Feb 2021, 07:13 PM IST Bloomberg
More than three billion people live in areas with mobile broadband but don’t use the internet. Why?
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A decade ago, less than a third of the people in developing regions had access to fast mobile internet connections. This “coverage gap, as it came to be known, was a worrisome phenomenon, especially to governments keen to compete in the knowledge economy and tech companies eager to profit from it. So in 2013, Alphabet Inc.’s Google announced Loon, a “moonshot project to provide internet to rural and remote regions using high-altitude balloons.
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BOSTON, Feb. 1, 2021 /PRNewswire/ In 2017, after four years of setbacks and crashes, Alphabet shut its project flying solar-powered fixed-wing drones in the upper atmosphere to beam the internet to those cut-off. Facebook then exited its similar project, but the Chinese aerospace industry, Airbus, Boeing, and NASA are progressing them very well. Aloft for years, they will take 5G and 6G communications to everyone, perform surveillance, and more. Meanwhile, Alphabet, parent of the mighty Google, has now dumped its upper-atmosphere balloon version as well.
The Chinese even have a smaller solar drone Mei Ying that survives night and day at the weaker light at 4600 meters for fast establishment of a WiFi emergency-information network and for surveillance in remote regions. Later it may team with 6G upper-atmosphere drones and low-earth-orbit LEO satellites. See the new IDTechEx report, 6G Communications Market, Devices, Materials 2021-2041
A series of experts working on affordable internet access and other technology for development efforts spoke out against Loon, posts on Twitter that it “sucked in the air“From discussions about affordable access and derived from”more realistic approachesTowards connectivity.
Google parent Alphabet shuts down Loon, its internet radiant balloon project https://t.co/yPB31X8mWs
Just to be clear, I’m the kind of person who says I told you.
Through Twitter.
According to John Garrity, an independent advisor to public and private sector organizations working on digital inclusion, organizations working to connect disconnected people can find a better balance between investing in existing approaches and considering new technologies.
Alphabet (GOOGL) Winds Up Internet Balloon Company Loon Zacks.com 1/26/2021
Alphabet GOOGL plans to close project Loon, which was set up to build giant balloons for connecting rural areas through Internet.
Founded in 2011, Loon was a subsidiary of Alphabet that used high-altitude balloons to provide Internet access to rural and remote areas.
Google stated that it was unable to find a sustainable business model and secure partners for this project. Also, regulatory challenges had been leading to a delay in the execution of the project.
Though the technology had earlier proved successful in certain places like Peru and Puerto Rico where cell towers were downed by natural disasters, it has not been that profitable for the company as earlier expected.