
The Telus Corporation, a Canadian purveyor of voices and data, has pledged its support. They shall invest in the terrestrial foundations—the ground-based infrastructure—upon which these satellites, these metallic birds, will rely. AST, for its part, provides the BlueBird satellites, those ambitious vessels intended to cast a net of connectivity across the vast, unforgiving landscapes of Canada. But it is not merely a transaction of technology and capital. Telus, it is revealed, shall also become a shareholder in AST, a mingling of fortunes that speaks to a deeper, perhaps more cynical, alignment of interests. One wonders if this is a genuine belief in the venture’s promise, or simply a prudent hedging of bets, a way to share in the potential gains, or mitigate the inevitable losses.