Darrell Etherington @etherington / 1 week
One of the original startups that set out to create a low-Earth orbit satellite constellation to provide a data network here on Earth is now open for business: Swarm , which now operates 81 of its sandwich-sized satellites on orbit, announced today that its network service is live and available to commercial customers.
Founded in 2017 by CEO Sara Spangelo and CTO Ben Longmier, Swarm has accomplished a lot in a relatively short time, culminating in its recent launch of 36 of its small satellites during SpaceX’s first ridesharing rocket launch late last month. Now that those are all online and operational, Swarm is able to provide full global network coverage, with the ability to check in with connected devices on its network up to multiple times per day.
Swarm’s offering uses embedded modems also designed and built by the company — the Swarm Tile, a tiny, low-powered modem that’s designed for maximum compatibility. The network is low-power and low-bandwidth, meaning it’s ideally suited for situations that require relatively low amounts of data transfer, but on a regular frequency over very long durations. That describes a wide range of use cases, including in shipping, logistics, agriculture and other Internet of Things (IoT ) deployments. The breadth of their customer base has actually been a surprise, and far outstripped the early vision for the startup.