Amazon just won a huge FCC approval to launch 3,236 Kuiper internet satellites — a $10 billion project that'd compete with SpaceX's emerging Starlink network

Samantha Lee/Business Insider

• Amazon wants to launch 3,236 internet-beaming satellites in an effort called Project Kuiper, which would directly compete with SpaceX's growing fleet of Starlink spacecraft.
• Despite heated competition, Amazon managed to trounce the opposition of its competitors and win US Federal Communications Commission approval to deploy Kuiper in space.
• SpaceX's Starlink project appears to be years ahead of Amazon's Kuiper, having already launched hundreds of satellites and started a beta test program for consumers.
• However, Amazon has committed to invest "more than $10 billion" to realize Kuiper and blanket Earth with affordable web access.
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Amazon, founded by Jeff Bezos in 1995, just claimed a major victory by getting regulatory approval to create Kuiper, a planned fleet or constellation of 3,236 of internet-beaming satellites.

If realized, Kuiper would compete with Starlink, a similar yet potentially much larger fleet of 12,000 to 42,000 satellites — many times the number of spacecraft humanity has ever launched — being formed by SpaceX, the aerospace company founded by Elon Musk.

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DON'T MISS: Billionaires plan to launch tens of thousands of new satellites. Experts are working hard to ensure this doesn't lead to a disaster that ends human access to orbit.

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