Months after killing its drone project, Facebook is testing experimental hardware at a new facility in the New Mexico desert

REUTERS/Stephen Lam

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg holds a propeller pod of the solar-powered Aquila drone on stage during a keynote at the Facebook F8 conference in San Francisco, California April 12, 2016.

• Facebook is building a "hardware prototype testing facility" to test experimental communications hardware in the New Mexico desert.
• Earlier this year, Facebook abandoned plans to build autonomous drones that would supply wireless internet to the developing world.
• But FCC filings seen by Business Insider indicate Facebook hasn't given up on hardware connectivity, and continues to actively test in the US.
• Expanding the global population of people with access to the internet will be essential for the 2.3 billion-user social network's growth in years to come.

Facebook may have ended its secretive internet drone project - but that doesn't mean its attempts to build experimental communications hardware are over.

Filings seen by Business Insider show that the California social network has been granted permission by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to build a secretive, previously unreported "hardware prototype testing facility" in the New Mexico desert to test long-range wireless communications technology.

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Back in June 2018, Facebook announced that it was ending its efforts to build giant, autonomous drones that could beam wireless internet down to the developing world. The closure of the "Aquila" project, which had been championed by CEO Mark Zuckerberg, came after a Business Insider investigation into upheaval and executive departures within the unit.

The company said that the closure didn't mean Facebook was giving up on developing communications technology. "While our focus in HAPS [High-Altitude Platform Stations] connectivity has shifted, we remain as committed as ever to addressing the three main barriers to connectivity: availability, affordability, and awareness," company executive Yael Maguire wrote at the time.

Facebook's connectivity efforts are one of its most-ambitious and far-out projects, and could prove crucial to the company's expansion in years to come. Facebook's core 2.27 billion-member social network has hit saturation point or even gone into decline in established markets like the US and Europe, and it may require physically connecting people in emerging markets to the internet for the first time ever to sustain the company's historically meteoric growth.

In August 2018, Facebook re-organised its connectivity efforts, bringing them all under one corporate umbrella - aptly named Facebook Connectivity. It hired an executive from wireless firm Ruckus Networks to lead the program, Dan Rabinovitsj. His LinkedIn job description: "Let's get the next billion people on the internet!"

The new FCC filings indicate that Facebook, via subsidiary FCL Tech, Inc., is continuing to actively build and test communications technology to this end, despite its earlier setbacks.

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Details on the test themselves are sparse.

The filing describes an application for testing LTE ("Long Term Evolution," a wireless communications standard) equipment, and notes that it will involved a mix of 15 different hardware devices from confidential manufacturers. It explains: "This LTE-based connectivity project requires a hardware prototype testing facility to assess key risks associated with LTE system connectivity and link budget verification."

It indicates the tests are for equipment with a range of up to 50 kilometers, while the height of the antennas suggest it will be at ground-level or close to it, rather than aerial, consulting wireless engineer Steven Crowley told Business Insider.

"First I note that they are specifying fixed operation (no mobile). That is the "FX" designation. So, it appears to be a point-to-point or point-to-multipoint network. What are going to be the points in any fixed network? Well, homes or businesses, or base stations that could connect with mobiles," Crowley wrote.

"They say they're testing equipment and I am afraid I cannot add much to that. 'Link budget verification' is to be tested over fairly long distances (50 km) so they may be testing the limits of the equipment to verify over what distance it can operate, or how low a power can be used at shorter distances."

A similar application was made back in February 2018, prior to the announcement of the drone project's closure. The most recent application was approved in October 2018, and is for a six month period, running through to the start of April, 2019.

It is based at or near Truth or Consequences, a city in New Mexico that is also the site of Spaceport America, a futuristic "spaceport" that Facebook once held a lease with and had discussions about building a drone hanger before the project fell apart.

In an email, Facebook spokesperson Liz Sweeney declined to provide more detail about the New Mexico tests.

"While we have nothing to share about specific projects at this time, we believe that new wireless technologies will be an important enabler of network infrastructure to help extend connectivity to areas that lack mobile broadband coverage," she wrote.

• Read more BI stories about Facebook:
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• Inside Facebook's plan to turn a scrapped AI project into a tool to reshape how millions communicate

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