Mats Hellqvist
Samsung seems to be getting inspiration from a new feature in Apple phones. It’s about the satellite communication of the iPhone 14 series. Apple has partnered with Globalstar to bring its Emergency SOS feature, which can send emergency calls via satellite to both the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Pro, to life. Samsung reportedly wants to work with Iridium to bring satellite communications to the upcoming Galaxy S23 series.
Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra renders
Iridium is a 66-part satellite constellation in low Earth orbit providing voice and data services. Samsung has been working on the technical challenges to bring satellite communications to smartphones for the last two years. According to rumors a breakthrough is on the horizon and the feature will come to the Galaxy S23 series. This allows sending of text messages and small images over satellite at a few hundred kbps.
Anyone who has seen a dedicated satellite phone will immediately recognize the challenge – the antenna has to be small enough to fit in a normal smartphone. Samsung doesn’t expect this feature to become a selling point back home in Korea. The country is rather small and the 5G coverage is very good. In North and South America, Europe, Russia and China, on the other hand, there is great potential because the infrastructure is not very well developed across the board.
According to previous leaks and rumors, the Galaxy S23 family will use a faster version of Qualcomm’s recently announced Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. The market launch is in the first week of February.
