Many Brazilians still do not have access to the internet, nor the prospect of having access, and this is due to numerous factors, whether it is the difficulty of carrying a cable or even getting the signal via radio, or the cost of internet via satellite, or the lack of government investment.

Even in the country’s large urban centers, it is estimated that 70 billion Brazilians have poor quality access to the internet and that 42 million have never had access. This is even worse, according to Cetic.br, between the D and E class of the population that generally only has access by cell phone and by the place they live, the operators’ services do not have the same quality as those offered in other places where other classes of social groups with the greatest purchasing power live.

Access, in practice, influences the economy, as small local businesses cannot use or create e-commerce to disseminate their products, education, and dissemination of information does not reach everyone in the same way. The government stops collecting and putting money in circulation, and everyone loses in some way.

The further away from people live in cities, the more difficult it is to access them, often using the internet via satellite. Today, besides being an expensive service with a very high installation rate, it has few options to choose from.

If it is necessary to use the internet via satellite, we note that we have only a few operators in the entire national territory that serve in some states. For this anticipated audience, monthly fees start at R$ 250.00 Reais per month, excluding the installation fee, making this an expensive option and often unfeasible.

Our government has started to conduct more in-depth studies on the situation in Brazil. However, there is still a need for greater investment to diversify access and for the policies adopted to reach the neediest areas, according to Diego Canabarro, senior manager of Public Policy at the Internet Society for Latin America:

“It is not enough to connect the unconnected, but to reduce asymmetries and not create digitization castes — the poor child in Brazil should have distance learning similar to the rich child in Brazil”

The lack of or low-quality internet access in the country became even more visible during the COVID-19 pandemic. Many people had to start using the internet overnight, whether for distance study or even to receive government assistance to survive these difficult times.

Looking at a business opportunity, the visionary entrepreneur Elon Musk through the SpaceX Company, started the Spacelink project, aiming to put more than 40 thousand satellites in orbit and offer quality internet at affordable prices, starting its operations in 2027 (optimistic forecast).

Other companies have also started their projects to put a gigantic number of satellites into orbit in an attempt to offer internet to the neediest people with the lowest purchasing power, as is the case of Amazon with the Kuiper project and with the AWS Ground Station project.

Another company that has also been targeting this market since 2016 is Facebook, which, until then, had been developing its project secretly and testing it on rockets. There is still the initiative is a group of companies is financing the OneWeb project, created in 2000, which has already placed several satellites in orbit and had the contribution of Airbus and the SoftBank Group in the adventure.

If, on the one hand, we have a heated market and big names like Elon Musk trying to put a massive number of satellites into orbit to offer quality internet, on the other hand, we have already started to follow some satellite complaints, making space observation difficult for some astronomers and with each passing day, the concern increases with the growing increase of the so-called space junk that is currently in orbit.

Still, when these visionary projects to place satellites in orbits mature enough to offer internet in the national territory, they will have to undergo a long process of approval and tests by Anatel. With all this, we can see that the internet has not arrived and will take a long time to reach all Brazilians across the country.

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