Amazon is geared up to put its first two test satellites into space during its "Protoflight" mission on Friday under Project Kuiper, the company's low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite broadband initiative to take on Elon Musk's Starlink.
The prototype satellites -- KuiperSat-1 and KuiperSat-2 -- are the first iterations of more than 3,200 satellites Project Kuiper plans to manufacture and deploy over the next six years.
Two prototype satellites will help the Project Kuiper team improve the technology and operations required to deliver fast, affordable broadband from space, Amazon said in a statement.
The company aims to have a constellation of over 3,200 in low Earth orbit to compete with Elon Musk’s Starlink, which currently has over 4,000 satellites in space to beam affordable Internet.
Its first production satellites are on track for launch in the first half of 2024, and Amazon expects to be in beta testing with early commercial customers by the end of 2024.
"We've done extensive testing here in our lab and have a high degree of confidence in our satellite design, but there’s no substitute for on-orbit testing," said Rajeev Badyal, Project Kuiper's vice president of technology.
"This is Amazon's first time putting satellites into space, and we're going to learn an incredible amount regardless of how the mission unfolds," Badyal added.
The Kuiper System includes three key elements: advanced LEO broadband satellites; small, affordable customer terminals; and a secure, resilient ground-based communications network. The Protoflight mission will test all three parts, along with the teams and systems that manage them.
The satellites will travel to space on an Atlas V rocket from United Launch Alliance (ULA) where ULA will deploy them at an altitude of 500 km.
"On the ground, we will test our advanced networking hardware and software to refine how they support the flow of data through the Kuiper System and AWS," said Amazon.
At the end of the mission, the company plans to actively de-orbit both satellites before they ultimately burn up in the Earth's atmosphere.