U.S. aerospace and material science company Sceye recently completed an important test mission that may revolutionize how we build and maintain far-reaching cellular networks. The mission, titled Service Test 1 (ST1), involved sending a so-called "cell tower in the sky" on an unprecedented round-trip flight from New Mexico to Japan. On Sceye's aircraft, the SceyeCELL tower traveled a total of nearly 19,000 miles over 30 days to complete its journey and return back home. During that time, SceyeCELL operated within Japanese-managed airspace for seven days and demonstrated mobile broadband connectivity to unmodified devices within the network of Sceye's Japanese partner company, SoftBank Corp.

Sceye specializes in building High Altitude Platform Systems (HAPS) that operate in the stratosphere. This stratospheric infrastructure promises to provide direct-to-device connectivity, drone communication, and edge computing in a way that's different from how satellite connectivity works on smartphones .…