TAIPEI (Reuters) – Taiwan is in talks with Amazon about collaborating for the company’s new Kuiper broadband internet constellation of satellites, the island’s technology minister said on Tuesday, as the government seeks to build communication resilience.
Taipei has been looking at plans to preserve communications if China attacks, including satellites in medium and low Earth orbit for internet services, similar to Ukraine’s use of Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite broadband service.
China views democratically-governed Taiwan as its own territory and has been stepping up its military activities around the island. The government in Taipei rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims.
Speaking to reporters, Taiwan Technology and Science Minister Wu Cheng-wen said the bandwidth for the island’s existing OneWeb satellite service was too small.
There are other Western companies Taiwan could work with, including in Europe and Canada, he said, without giving names, but said Amazon had the product that was most far along in its development.
“Amazon’s Kuiper is the most mature in the development stage so far, so we are discussing at this moment whether its possible to have a collaboration,” Wu added, without elaborating.
Amazon, which plans a network of more than 3,000 satellites that will compete with SpaceX’s Starlink, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Taiwan has also been sending its own satellites into space using rockets fired by foreign companies including Arianespace, a joint venture of Airbus and Safran.
But the island wants to be able to use its own rockets, and Wu said officials expect to make a decision around late March on a launch pad location, probably along its far southeast coast where the military has missile firing ranges.
It will then take about five years before the site is operational, he added.
(Reporting by Ben Blanchard and Wen-Yee Lee; Editing by Kate Mayberry)
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