Elon Musk, SpaceX founder, says Starlink, the company’s satellite internet service, has been approved in Nigeria.
Musk said this on Friday via his verified Twitter page.
In 2021, TheCable reported that the company, which saw Nigeria as a critical market, was in talks with the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to secure licences needed to launch Starlink.
On Tuesday, Musk had hinted at rolling out the satellite internet service in Africa on his Twitter account after a user asked about his plans for Africa.
Consequently, the billionaire, who is also the founder of Tesla Inc. announced the approval of the internet service on Friday.
“Starlink approved by Nigeria and Mozambique,” Musk tweeted.
He added that the satellite internet service has also been approved by the Philippines.
According to SpaceX, Starlink was launched as a low-earth orbiting (LOE) constellation of satellites to provide low latency, high bandwidth internet to consumers across the globe.
A low latency network connection is one that generally experiences small delay times, while bandwidth refers to the amount of information that a connection to the internet can handle at a given time.
Starlink internet is said to work by sending information through the vacuum of space, where it travels much faster than in fiber-optic cable.
It is also said to be ideally suited for areas where connectivity has typically been unreliable or completely unavailable.
In February, Musk had announced the activation of the satellite internet service in Ukraine.
With the approval, Starlink will be rivalling 5G licence operators such as MTN Nigeria and Mafab Communications; as well as other internet service providers like Globacom, Airtel, and 9mobile.
(The Cable)
