STAR LIGHT, DATA BRIGHT

Starlink is making it easier and less expensive for boaters to stay better connected in countless locations.

- DAVID SCHMIDT

JOHN BLACKBURN'S soon-to-be employers likely had little idea that he was aboard his Jeanneau 44 when they interviewed him for a C-suite position. Blackburn donned a jacket, blurred his background and used his Starlink Roam satellite-communications system to interview with two organizations while cruising Lake Superior's remote Apostle Islands. ¶ "I was able to connect with 110 percent confidence," he says, adding that Wi-Fi and cellular communications weren't dependable at his favorite anchorages. "I couldn't have done that before." ¶ True market disruptions are rare. These days, they often involve Elon Musk, who has invested in everything from Tesla and OpenAI to SpaceX. With Starlink, Musk's ever-growing constellation of low-Earth-orbit satellites (LEOS) combines with a supporting network and flat-panel dishes to give boaters faster connection speeds, lower latency and much lower costs than previous VSAT options. ¶ Starlink's origin story includes the date May 23, 2019, when a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket released the first tranche of 60 Starlink LEOs. Today, Starlink has more than 4,500 LEOs aloft. The company plans to create a mega-constellation involving upwards of 42,000 LEOs. ¶ Like all satellites, Starlink's LEOs relay information to and from ground stations. Unlike most other satellites, however, these LEOs carry optical lasers that relay data among themselves, without ground stations. ¶ Distance further differentiates Starlink from legacy VSAT networks, which typically use geostationary (GEO) satellites to ferry data.