Facebook's fleet of drones to beam web access

Facebook is building a fleet of V-shaped unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), also known as drones, to help the company with its Internet. org project that aims to beam internet access to the five billion people that don't have it yet.

According to a report, Facebook has a codename for its drone: Aquila, which is also the name of the eagle in Greek mythology that carries Zeus's thunderbolts for him. Aquila can reportedly stay in the air for up to three months at a time, and beam high-speed internet from between 60,000 and 90,000 feet in the air. They'll be lighter than a small car, but as long as a Boeing 767.

The first flights will reportedly begin this summer, although commercial deployment may take several years. Facebook executives are not sure how much the final version of Aquila will cost the company.

Aquila was accomplished via Facebook's acquisition of the drone maker Ascenta in 2014. But now that this project is under Facebook's wing, the company is also looking for partners to help get the project off the ground, in return for allowing those companies to use their data and technology.

The Internet.org initiative, created in August 2013, is one of the ways Facebook aims to spread its influence. By partnering up with mobile companies like Samsung, Qualcomm and Microsoft, Facebook hopes to eventually offer universal affordable internet access, similar to Google's Project Loon, where high flying balloons beam down WiFi to areas without internet.