According to a blog post from Alphabet’s X-Moon Shot division, Alphabet Loon, the division that provides internet of floating balloons, is closing down.
“The road to commercial viability has proven to be much longer and riskier than hoped for,” Astro Teller, who leads X, wrote in the blog. “In the coming months we’ll start trading and it will no longer be another bet within the alphabet.”
Alphabet, Google’s parent company, launched Loon in June 2013 and in 2018 Loon ‘graduated’ a lunar eclipse to an independent company in Alphabet. In July, Loon launched its first commercial Internet service in Kenya, consisting of a fleet of about 35 balloons covering an area of about 50,000 square kilometers. Loon also provided internet services to areas affected by natural disasters, and balloons were deployed to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017 and to Peru after an earthquake in 2019.
Teller says Loon is putting employees in other roles at X, Google and Alphabet. “A small group of the Loon team will remain to ensure that Loon’s operations are completed smoothly and safely. This includes the abolition of Loon’s pilot service in Kenya,” according to Teller. Wage service in Kenya lasts until March, says an X spokesperson The edge. To support those in Kenya who may be affected by the loss of Loon’s service, Loon pledges $ 10 million to support non-profit organizations and businesses in Kenya that are committed to ‘connectivity, internet, entrepreneurship and education’.
Wage is not the only moonlight that has turned Alphabet off. Last year, it introduced Makani, which aimed to use kites-attached wind turbines to create renewable electricity. And Project Foghorn, which is investigating clean fuel from seawater, ended its work in 2016.