Over the past few months, Elon Musk has been knocking on the doors of major US operators. Their offer was simple: use their telephone network to offer mobile satellite services with Starlink. They all told him no. Anyone who would have given up. But Musk has done what only Musk can do: set up his own operators and compete with those who slam the door in his face.
Within weeks it had bought frequencies, talked to antenna owners and signed up a 5G technology provider to launch satellite telephone networks that others didn’t want to set up.
A knock on the door of Telcos. The clear rejection came with the third quarter results. T-Mobile CEO Srini Gopalan has canceled any Mobile Virtual Operator (MVNO) agreement with SpaceX. This type of MVNO deal involves renting another operator’s network and selling the service under its own brand, so Starlink will become a virtual operator with satellite connectivity services.
Gopalan claims that “satellite is a lower version of FWA, with more limitations, such as beam size.” FWA (Fixed wireless access) is a mode of fixed Internet access over a mobile network that will contribute to the expansion of Starlink’s current offering. Verizon’s Dan Shulman was equally blunt, saying “I see absolutely no benefit” to a satellite communications provider offering an MVNO platform.
If they don’t let you have the network, you buy the frequency. With telecom companies refusing to give him access to their telephone networks, Musk went for the most scarce resource: spectrum. SpaceX paid Echostar about $17 billion in cash and stock. The package included frequencies in the 2 GHz band, which are designed for talking to mobile phones from space.
In October, the second key piece of the strategy Musk had been developing arrived. SpaceX has agreed to buy up to 14 MHz in the 800 MHz band from Grain Management. These are lower waves, which pass through the walls and reach the interior of the building. According to SpaceX, with these bands Starlink Mobile could be “the first network operator to deploy satellite and terrestrial spectrum.” The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has yet to approve the operation.
Towers and chips for ground networks. However, while SpaceX already has the ability to send satellite and telephone signals, it still needs something basic: antennas to deliver those signals. Bloomberg He announced that SpaceX is seeking access to at least 80,000 antennas in the United States. That would be half of the 158,500 towers last year, according to the Wireless Infrastructure Association.
To equip these sites, SpaceX just signed an alliance with Qualcomm through which the manufacturer will supply its Dragonwing platforms for thousands of Starlink Mobile ground base stations, starting in 2027.
Boost Mobile, or how to buy subscribers. Having the satellites, frequency spectrum, antennas and technology needed to build his telephone network, Musk was missing only one thing: paying customers’ bills. The Washington Post reported that SpaceX is in talks to buy Boost Mobile, which would be an entry into the $235 billion telephone market. If all goes well, Musk will control the entire chain: satellites, terrestrial networks and stores.
The paradox is that few telecom companies can say the same, as operators do not have their own satellites. In Europe, Telefonica, Orange and Vodafone have united against Starlink and as detailed ForbesThey have not yet selected a space partner. Virtual operators, on the other hand, depend on a foreign network, exactly what Musk was denied, they denied and now he is going to build himself.
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Picture | Flickr (Gage Skidmore)
