 Hey, it's Ben Popper with The Verge. I'm here at the debut of Starry, a new company that is promising to bring you super high speed internet over the air. So Starry says it can deliver you gigabit speed internet. We've seen this before from Google and Comcast and Verizon, but that was delivered through fiber under the ground. Starry is promising to do it over the air. No construction, no big wires coming into your house. It's beamed to you like it was Wi-Fi. They're using a part of the spectrum known as millimeter wave. Up till now, it's been extremely difficult to broadcast internet signal over that with distance and accuracy. They say they've come up with some crazy new technology that can do it, and they want to sell you a very fancy Wi-Fi router to grab that signal. That Wi-Fi router would work with ordinary internet. To become your ISP, they also have to build out a network all across the city. They're starting in Boston this March. They're going to put these giant phased array stations in, and they're also going to sell consumers a two-part system that sits outside their house to grab the signal and inside to broadcast it to your station. So you had a really ambitious start-up in area taking on big TV. Now you have a really ambitious start-up in the broadband internet world. And I think one of the things you talked about was that there are some real issues with broadband access in the country. Maybe talk to me a little bit about what was the motivation here. You know, globally there's going to be ever increasing desire for broadband, and right now there are efforts going on from a coverage perspective, but in dense metropolitan areas, you have to build a broadband system if you're going to keep up with it. So we decided that this made a lot of sense. I think in the U.S. there's tremendous opportunity because of the competitive dynamics and how difficult it is to actually build out a broadband system. Right. So this is far easier, right, than digging up the ground to put in fiber or flying a fleet of drones overhead that are beaming down the internet. The issue was that... I like drones. That's a good idea. You're welcome to use drones as well, maybe, you know, redundant technology. But the issue was that for millimeter wave, which is what you guys are using, nobody had figured out how to make it go far enough and be able to penetrate walls. Those are the kind of the two problems that you had to solve. But far enough is a complex problem because it's not just... you can make anything go far enough. It's a question of how much power you want to put through it. I mean, just to put it in context, right, a satellite when it communicates with a downlink, it's roughly in the millimeter... not roughly, it falls in the millimeter wave bands. It's just a ton of power that's coming down. Power is expensive. And I don't mean like wattage is expensive. The technology to create our power is probably expensive. So the challenge is to solve how do you do far enough with low cost, which is commercially viable. Gotcha. It's a very ambitious kind of wild plan to take on big broadband. They don't actually own the spectrum they want to use yet. They're just testing it from the SEC. They're hoping to either win it in the upcoming auction or license it from the person who does. This is a company that tried to take on and revolutionize the way we watch TV. They ended up losing, but it went all the way to the Supreme Court. Now they're trying to radically rethink the way we get internet, high speed internet. We'll have to see how it turns out this time.
 Hey, it's Ben Popper with The Verge.
 I'm here at the debut of Starry, a new company that is promising to bring you super high
 speed internet over the air.
 So Starry says it can deliver you gigabit speed internet.
 We've seen this before from Google and Comcast and Verizon, but that was delivered through
 fiber under the ground.
 Starry is promising to do it over the air.
 No construction, no big wires coming into your house.
 It's beamed to you like it was Wi-Fi.
 They're using a part of the spectrum known as millimeter wave.
 Up till now, it's been extremely difficult to broadcast internet signal over that with
 distance and accuracy.
 They say they've come up with some crazy new technology that can do it, and they want to
 sell you a very fancy Wi-Fi router to grab that signal.
 That Wi-Fi router would work with ordinary internet.
 To become your ISP, they also have to build out a network all across the city.
 They're starting in Boston this March.
 They're going to put these giant phased array stations in, and they're also going to sell
 consumers a two-part system that sits outside their house to grab the signal and inside
 to broadcast it to your station.
 So you had a really ambitious start-up in area taking on big TV.
 Now you have a really ambitious start-up in the broadband internet world.
 And I think one of the things you talked about was that there are some real issues with broadband
 access in the country.
 Maybe talk to me a little bit about what was the motivation here.
 You know, globally there's going to be ever increasing desire for broadband, and right
 now there are efforts going on from a coverage perspective, but in dense metropolitan areas,
 you have to build a broadband system if you're going to keep up with it.
 So we decided that this made a lot of sense.
 I think in the U.S. there's tremendous opportunity because of the competitive dynamics and how
 difficult it is to actually build out a broadband system.
 Right.
 So this is far easier, right, than digging up the ground to put in fiber or flying a
 fleet of drones overhead that are beaming down the internet.
 The issue was that...
 I like drones.
 That's a good idea.
 You're welcome to use drones as well, maybe, you know, redundant technology.
 But the issue was that for millimeter wave, which is what you guys are using, nobody had
 figured out how to make it go far enough and be able to penetrate walls.
 Those are the kind of the two problems that you had to solve.
 But far enough is a complex problem because it's not just... you can make anything go
 far enough.
 It's a question of how much power you want to put through it.
 I mean, just to put it in context, right, a satellite when it communicates with a downlink,
 it's roughly in the millimeter... not roughly, it falls in the millimeter wave bands.
 It's just a ton of power that's coming down.
 Power is expensive.
 And I don't mean like wattage is expensive.
 The technology to create our power is probably expensive.
 So the challenge is to solve how do you do far enough with low cost, which is commercially
 viable.
 Gotcha.
 It's a very ambitious kind of wild plan to take on big broadband.
 They don't actually own the spectrum they want to use yet.
 They're just testing it from the SEC.
 They're hoping to either win it in the upcoming auction or license it from the person who
 does.
 This is a company that tried to take on and revolutionize the way we watch TV.
 They ended up losing, but it went all the way to the Supreme Court.
 Now they're trying to radically rethink the way we get internet, high speed internet.
 We'll have to see how it turns out this time.