Blues is launching Starnote for Iridium, an affordable way to add global, pole-to-pole satellite failover to any product built on Notecard Cellular, Wifi or Cell+Wifi.

Powered by Iridium’s low Earth orbit (LEO) constellation, Starnote for Iridium delivers coverage anywhere on Earth, including open ocean, polar regions and remote locations beyond the reach of terrestrial and regional satellite networks.

Each device includes 10kbyte of bundled satellite uplink and downlink data, with no satellite provider subscription, no activation step and no monthly minimum.

From a developer’s point of view, Starnote for Iridium works as an additional radio access technology for Notecard. Users keep using the same JSon-based Notecard APIs, and configure fallback behaviour to use Iridium satellite when cellular is unavailable.

“Cellular networks cover a lot of the planet, but not all of it,” said Rob Lauer, senior director at Massachusetts-based Blues (blues.com). “Regional satellite networks fill in many of the gaps, but they still leave blank spots like most of the open ocean, the polar regions and deeply remote corners of the planet. Iridium is different. Its LEO constellation provides genuinely global coverage. That makes Starnote for Iridium a natural fit for maritime asset tracking, remote environmental and agricultural monitoring, and global logistics and supply chain visibility, anywhere a device needs to phone home, no matter where on the planet it ends up. And like the rest of the Blues satellite lineup, Starnote for Iridium is designed to challenge the assumption that global satellite connectivity demands expensive hardware and mandatory monthly fees, even when your devices aren’t actively transmitting.

The Starnote for Iridium starter kit (shop.blues.com/products/starnote-for-iridium-kit) includes everything needed to start prototyping with cellular, wifi and global satellite connectivity, including: Starnote for Iridium; Notecard Cell+Wifi (global LTE Cat 1bis); Notecarrier XI; Iridium helical satellite antenna; and 5000mAh LiPo battery.

To see an introductory video, go to www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKgaEpfCAjI.