Secret plan "Project SkyBender" that realizes 5G communication with Google as base station for drone that keeps flying automatically with sunlight

It was revealed that Google is conducting a flight test of a large drone that generates electricity with solar power and fly automatically. This drone flight test project is "Project Skybender"It seems that communication test by millimeter wave is also going on in parallel.Drone for shippingAlthough it is also known to be developing Google, in the Skybender project it is thought that it is aiming to provide a 5G ultra high speed mobile line that is up to 40 times faster than 4G from the sky using millimeter waves.

Project Skybender: Google's secretive 5G internet drone tests revealed | Technology | The Guardian
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jan/29/project-skybender-google-drone-tests-internet-spaceport-virgin-galactic

The GuardianAccording to Google, the Commercial Space Port in New Mexico, USASpaceport AmericaWe are repeating the drone flight test of Skybender project borrowing the site of. The flying drones are Titan Aerospace's long-time flying drones "Titan" that Google acquired in 2014 and Google aircraft "Centaur (Centaur)" which can be switched manned and unmanned as needed is.


Titan AerospaceFederal Communications Commission (FCC), He got approval to conduct a flight test in New Mexico until July 2016, and based on this, a flight test using a drone is being done on the Spaceport America premises.


In addition, Google borrowed a storage space of 15,000 square feet (approximately 1,400 square meters) from the Virgin Galactic as a hangar to store the drone at a price of $ 1,000 a day (about 120,000 yen), and further hired $ 300,000 (about 36 million It is said that we have installed a dedicated equipment test system paying additional cost of yen). And it seems that radio test of transmission using millimeter wave is being conducted by this equipment test system.


The communication test using millimeter waves is seen as aiming to provide super high speed mobile communication line from above. Google is experimenting with millimeter waves in the 28 GHz band and is a frequency band that can realize 5 G communication which can be expected to achieve high speed communication up to 40 times as high as 4 G (LTE) communication. However, it is a major disadvantage that millimeter waves are about 1 / 10th of that of 4G and its transmission range is short. Google will develop phased array (phased array) technology to compensate for this low propagation of millimeter waves It is necessary. Professor Jacques Ledel of the University of Washington, an electrical engineering expert, said, "It will be extremely complicated, difficult and labor intensive to put millimeter waves into practical use as mobile communications from the air," said Communications Technology We point out the difficulty of development.

Combining ultra high-speed mobile communication technology with millimeter waves to drone that continues to fly fully automatic for a long time by getting energy from sunlight with Titan Aerospace's drone technology If the Skybender project solves technical problems and is put into practical use, what kind of frontier Even in the land of comfortable mobile communication seems to be possible.