The Musk Starlink is not ready to govern the Internet waves of Europe – Politico

A recent report from the European Commission revealed that around 79% of European households are already covered by “very high capacity” networks-that is to say a download speed of at least 1,000 megabits per second Or 1 gigabit – increasingly thanks to an ultra -fast “fiber” relationships.

“If I were a customer, if I can get fibers, I will take fiber … If I don’t have good broadband of one of the traditional means, then great, I will have the satellites if he please, “said Robert Mourik, president of the European telecommunications dog organization Berec.

Starlink offers speeds up to five times slower than Europeans can obtain – ranging from 25 to 220 Mbps, depending on the location, network congestion and weather conditions. It is also lower than the fiber networks with regard to latency, while the data takes to go to a server and return, which is essential for online games, videoconference, virtual reality and autonomous vehicles .

Although convinced for daily use of the Internet, the Starlink bandwidth will not be sufficient to shake the European market, where consumers can afford a much better connection at lower prices – even if the data suggest that they did not despair of gigabit plans.

“In Europe, in fact, it is more difficult to obtain customers because fiber is a very attractive alternative,” said Jan Frederik Slijkerman, telecommunications analyst at Dutch Multinational Bank ING.

Throughout the European Union, a Starlink subscription would cost on average around € 49 per month, plus an initial € for the terminal kit, against € 21.32 for a similar offer of traditional internet suppliers.