Russia on Tuesday launched 16 low-orbit satellites as part of its plan to build a domestic network that could one day compete with Elon Musk’s Starlink, the Russian aerospace firm Bureau 1440 said. The deployment represents the country’s first batch of operational satellites for a low-Earth-orbit broadband system.
“The launch of the first devices of the target group is a transition from experiment to the creation of a communication service,” Bureau 1440 said in a statement, signaling a move toward providing global broadband data delivery.
Despite this launch, Russia remains far behind Starlink, which began operations in 2019 and has since grown to more than 10,000 satellites in orbit, providing high-speed internet around the world.
The effort reflects Russia’s ambition to reclaim a prominent role in space communications, a field in which the country once led early milestones. The Soviet Union famously launched Sputnik 1 in 1957 and sent Yuri Gagarin into orbit in 1961, becoming the first human to orbit Earth.
However, after the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991, Russia’s space program suffered from funding shortages, management issues, and corruption, slowing its progress in global satellite communications. Reports suggest that early dismissals of Elon Musk’s ambitions by Russian officials in 2002 inadvertently spurred him to innovate and reduce launch costs, contributing to Starlink’s rapid expansion.
Bureau 1440’s launch signals Russia’s intent to regain ground in the commercial and strategic satellite market, although catching up to Starlink’s extensive constellation will take years of development and investment.
