The good news: a new satellite service called Iridium Certus will offer phone and internet service to people anywhere in New Zealand or, in fact, almost every corner of the world from March. Say goodbye to blackspots.
The bad: the pricing is out-of-this-world. And its bandwidth is closer to dial-up speed than fibre.
Iridium Certus has been made possible by the US$3 billion Iridium NEXT satellite constellation launched by Elon Musk's Space X – the eighth and final launch took place last week, seeing a total of 75 new satellites deployed over less than two years.
Pivotel will sell access to Certus for Kiwis and Aussies.
Phone plans will cost from $130 per month. Broadband will also cost from $130 per month, but with the base price including a measly 10 megabytes of data.