29 Aug 2025
1 min read
Margo Anderson is senior associate editor and telecommunications editor at IEEE Spectrum.
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The future of wireless communication is today being sketched out in the skies and in space. A new generation of intelligent aerospace platforms—drones, airships, and satellites—will be part of tomorrow’s 6G networks, acting as, in effect, base stations in the sky. They’re expected to roll out in the early 2030s.
Researchers at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Thuwal, Saudi Arabia, are amid the vanguard of innovators now imagining next-gen telecom networks in the atmosphere, the stratosphere, and orbit.
The sky won't be the limit for next-gen wireless platforms
Future wireless platforms will take a layered approach, from low-flying drones to geosynchronous satellites.
John MacNeill
Margo Anderson is senior associate editor and telecommunications editor at IEEE Spectrum. She has a bachelor’s degree in physics and a master’s degree in astrophysics.