OneWeb Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
Lord Alderdice
Main Page: Lord Alderdice (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Alderdice's debates with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Callanan
The Government will invest $500 million, on an equal basis with Bharti Global Ltd. As part of the agreement, a small equity stake will be held by existing OneWeb creditors. This is not specifically designed for global national positioning systems; these satellites operate in a lower orbit for a number of missions, but primarily for earth observations and tele-communications.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Alderdice) (LD)
I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Willetts, is not with us, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Birt.
Lord Birt (CB) [V]
My Lords, I declare an interest as a former member of the board of Eutelsat. LEO is potentially a breakthrough technology, but it is also very high risk, as the collapse of OneWeb so vividly demonstrates. What scale of investment will be needed to build out a commercially viable constellation? How will that investment be funded, whether by debt or equity?