>> Starlink is also going to be seeing competition in the coming years thanks to companies like OneWeb and Telesat, which plans to create smaller constellations that will offer service by 2021. Tech giants like Amazon and Samsung have also announced plans to deploy their own constellations, which would consist of 3,236 to 4600 broadband satellites, respectively.
SpaceX has a huge advantage in launch costs here. Mass produced satellites will be lower cost per unit than most others, and launching on used rockets will give them the cheapest deployment costs ever. And they are the only company that can reuse rockets today. I don't see the competitors really having a chance.
Is anyone worried about space pollution and Kessler effect? There's currently around 5000 satellites up there, and each of these companies alone wants to put that much more in space.
The true power of such systems is that they might eventually help overthrow hegemony of the BigTelco, who have been in bed with governments for as long as they have been in existence.
I'm excited to see what this would mean not just for the internet but mobile communication systems that are so much dependant on a few vendors and MNOs that have time and again proven to breach on privacy repeatedly [0][1]. For instance, there's no viable open source baseband alternative for 4G+ mobile devices [2][3][4][5], and acquiring frequency and setting up base stations is mired neck deep in regulations and patents [6], so there is not much room for a startup to disrupt the incumbent.
Given the advent of eSIMs and increase in embedded SecureElements [7] in smartphones, the traditional way of going mobile might soon be gone for good. I, for one, can't wait.
Does anyone work on building satellites like the ones mentioned here? what is a normal day in the life at a job like that? Are you pulling 40+ hrs/week ?
At some point SpaceX is going to start flying the Superheavy, which will be able to carry hundreds of satellites at once, and cost less per launch than Falcon 9 because the second stage will be reusable. That will give it a huge cost advantage.
At some point they'll also start regularly flying the heavy. It's about 3 years behind schedule now, and their satellite constellation has much shorter timespans.
Doesn't distribution in space become an issue if you release several hundred satellites from the same rocket and need to get them into position without any collision risk?
If they do actually beat microwave towers, HFTs will be their first and most enthusiastic customers. SpaceX would not even need any specific strategy for the money to come from HFT. For biggest revenues, add steeply tiered pricing for the best latency, maybe even a bidding process.
If they tried to keep those gains in-house and did their own HFT I would not be surprised if exchanges then found ways to define rules that weaken HFT as a whole. Just a gut feeling that you need to be part of the culture surrounding the exchanges to be in that game and keep winning.
Hybernia from NYC to London is about 55ms whereas I remember reading somewhere these satellites would have a 30ms ping. So probably not for cross-Atlantic propagation once you add all the switching and hops, but maybe cross-Pacific might be doable since propagation delay in space is lower than in fiber.
Realistically, no. High frequency trading is a niche and not hugely profitable market. Not really worth disrupting when there is a much bigger opportunity in delivering internet access to billions of people and many billions of devices.
Interesting point. However, I believe frequency trading relies on connections with extremely low latency, while satellite links are characterized by high Round Trip Time.
I wonder how this will affect Iridium in the long term. They target applications that provide critical services with low bandwidth requirements, and a need for small lightweight antennas with low power use.
Starlink's design doesn't fit those requirements for now. But I'm not sure whether Starlink will stay out of that market if they will be continuously upgrading their swarm.
On the other hand, it would be strange if SpaceX destroyed Iridium's business model after launching their latest generation satellites for them...
I could see a market where you put up a Starlink base station, which communicates to regular phones via LTE or WiFi. That could cover the use case of many Iridium deployments, where you are always within range of a camp or vehicle.
> What happens to inactive satellites? Do they de-orbit themselves in safe locations? Or just stay as space junk?
I believe they plan to use the last bit of their propellant to lower the perigee into the atmosphere, which will then naturally deorbit. They recently submitted documents to the FCC stating a change to materials to ensure everything burns up and wont impact the earth. [1]
They're only a few hundred pounds each. Falcon 9 can launch 50,000 lbs to LEO in expandable mode, so probably about 30,000 lbs when reusable, meaning they could launch close to 100 if they weighed 300lbs (there'd also be a deployment structure etc).
44 seems very doable, and they'd just burn up like any other satellite.
Each Starlink satellite is likely to be in the range of 200–300 kg. Roughly the size of ~220L fridge when panels are folded.
The plan for active decommissioning is to drop perigee into “atmosphere” but there are also plans for passively deorbiting satellites that fail while in higher orbits which would otherwise take Millenia to de orbit on their own.
Depends on a bunch of variables of course but ballpark a few million monthly users would probably be good enough.
The falcon heavy launches are going to be ballpark somewhere around 90 million. So excluding the satellite construction that's what it costs to launch around 70-100 satellites. They need at least about 30-35 launches. So ballpark that means a it is going to take probably 3-4 billion. Of course that is excluding the production cost for the satellites and other infrastructure. Lets call it 10 billion altogether, give or take a few billion.
Not a crazy amount to spend on infrastructure in the telco world. German operators paid tens of billions just for spectrum licenses. Considering you'd be able to compete world wide with this, 10 billion is a bargain.
It's still a lot of money of course but with a few million customers paying in the order of 10-40$ per month it would earn it self back quite rapidly. Even at the low end of that price range. Arguably they could charge more.
No, it won't. These satellites are placed close to earth, so they will deorbit after some time. An orbit this close to earth is not sustainable, you need fuel to keep the orbit going. Once the fuel runs out, or the satellite malfunctions, it will fall back into the earth's atmosphere and burn.
It's also in the article:
> Second, there’s the matter of attrition, as satellites will begin to deorbit after a few years and SpaceX will need to replace them regularly in order to maintain its constellation.
I don't believe the required billions of financing for this project has been obtained yet.
I am skeptical of the utility, since most humans live in dense cities, where it is both cheaper and faster to run fiber (even to 5G towers) than it is for millions of people to choke on a handful of satellites. This offering is only compelling for regions that have no people and no infrastructure (and therefore no money). All signs point to another Teledesic or Iridium.
As someone who does not live in a dense city, and is willing and capable of paying for a service such as Starlink, I resent the idea that it is not a worthwhile endeavor.
You may be underestimating the resentment with current duopoly operators in the US. I live in a dense city and I would switch in a heartbeat even if Starlink didn't offer better/faster/cheaper service. Just being on par would be enough.
Planes, boats, busses, trains, cars, and rural sites can all massively benefit from a much bigger bandwidth pipe with low latency. Add in the US military which has already given spacex $28.7 million dollars to see if they can put it on all their vehicles (planes in particular for that award) and I think they have a decent sized market.
Once upon a time power companies refused to provide grid access to people outside of the cities because it didn't make money fast enough, the government stepped in and made it happen and now not being able to get a power hookup is a ridiculous notion. If this doesn't happen, the government will have to step in again, otherwise those people either become second class citizens or they get really angry at being excluded from society and take violent action.
As someone who lives in a dense city (Sydney), I can tell you that I would use this satellite internet if it's faster than the ADSL2 and poop fibre most people get at home.
That's unfair to the millions of Americans living in rural areas having to cope with current slow speeds. Don't you want the world more connected?
The problem with the current scenario is ISPs and wireless providers won't run lines or stand up towers for a low populated area. They know they won't ever make the money back for the project. With low orbit satellites this problem is solved. Would you rather those people live in the past just because they don't choose to live in the city?
[+] [-] phkahler|7 years ago|reply
SpaceX has a huge advantage in launch costs here. Mass produced satellites will be lower cost per unit than most others, and launching on used rockets will give them the cheapest deployment costs ever. And they are the only company that can reuse rockets today. I don't see the competitors really having a chance.
[+] [-] BurningFrog|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ehsankia|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] goshx|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ignoramous|7 years ago|reply
I'm excited to see what this would mean not just for the internet but mobile communication systems that are so much dependant on a few vendors and MNOs that have time and again proven to breach on privacy repeatedly [0][1]. For instance, there's no viable open source baseband alternative for 4G+ mobile devices [2][3][4][5], and acquiring frequency and setting up base stations is mired neck deep in regulations and patents [6], so there is not much room for a startup to disrupt the incumbent.
Given the advent of eSIMs and increase in embedded SecureElements [7] in smartphones, the traditional way of going mobile might soon be gone for good. I, for one, can't wait.
---
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17081684
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6722292
[2] https://github.com/srsLTE/srsLTE
[3] https://telecominfraproject.com
[4] https://www.opennetworking.org
[5] https://osmocom.org
[6] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11931072
[7] https://www.nfcworld.com/2018/08/07/357810/android-9-nfc-sec...
[+] [-] ggm|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baud147258|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sschueller|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kristofferR|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] abledon|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] woodandsteel|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shaklee3|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dx034|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sambroner|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] usrusr|7 years ago|reply
If they tried to keep those gains in-house and did their own HFT I would not be surprised if exchanges then found ways to define rules that weaken HFT as a whole. Just a gut feeling that you need to be part of the culture surrounding the exchanges to be in that game and keep winning.
[+] [-] CoolGuySteve|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gizmo|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] frazar0|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wcoenen|7 years ago|reply
Starlink's design doesn't fit those requirements for now. But I'm not sure whether Starlink will stay out of that market if they will be continuously upgrading their swarm.
On the other hand, it would be strange if SpaceX destroyed Iridium's business model after launching their latest generation satellites for them...
[+] [-] derekp7|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kylek|7 years ago|reply
>> ... averaging 44 satellites per launch.
How big are these things and how many can _actually_ be put up in a single launch?
>> However, SpaceX intends to use this to their advantage by gradually replacing inactive satellites ...
What happens to inactive satellites? Do they de-orbit themselves in safe locations? Or just stay as space junk?
[+] [-] SECProto|7 years ago|reply
I believe they plan to use the last bit of their propellant to lower the perigee into the atmosphere, which will then naturally deorbit. They recently submitted documents to the FCC stating a change to materials to ensure everything burns up and wont impact the earth. [1]
[1] https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2019/03/spacex-higher-necess...
[+] [-] ceejayoz|7 years ago|reply
44 in one launch is very doable. They’ve done 64 in a launch before: https://www.google.com/amp/s/phys.org/news/2018-12-spacex-sa...
[+] [-] martythemaniak|7 years ago|reply
44 seems very doable, and they'd just burn up like any other satellite.
[+] [-] manicdee|7 years ago|reply
The plan for active decommissioning is to drop perigee into “atmosphere” but there are also plans for passively deorbiting satellites that fail while in higher orbits which would otherwise take Millenia to de orbit on their own.
[+] [-] louprado|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pmorici|7 years ago|reply
I believe groundcontrol.com sells or rents all three.
[+] [-] dalbasal|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jillesvangurp|7 years ago|reply
The falcon heavy launches are going to be ballpark somewhere around 90 million. So excluding the satellite construction that's what it costs to launch around 70-100 satellites. They need at least about 30-35 launches. So ballpark that means a it is going to take probably 3-4 billion. Of course that is excluding the production cost for the satellites and other infrastructure. Lets call it 10 billion altogether, give or take a few billion.
Not a crazy amount to spend on infrastructure in the telco world. German operators paid tens of billions just for spectrum licenses. Considering you'd be able to compete world wide with this, 10 billion is a bargain.
It's still a lot of money of course but with a few million customers paying in the order of 10-40$ per month it would earn it self back quite rapidly. Even at the low end of that price range. Arguably they could charge more.
[+] [-] tzfld|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LeonM|7 years ago|reply
It's also in the article:
> Second, there’s the matter of attrition, as satellites will begin to deorbit after a few years and SpaceX will need to replace them regularly in order to maintain its constellation.
[+] [-] Proven|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] oxyboy|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 7e|7 years ago|reply
I am skeptical of the utility, since most humans live in dense cities, where it is both cheaper and faster to run fiber (even to 5G towers) than it is for millions of people to choke on a handful of satellites. This offering is only compelling for regions that have no people and no infrastructure (and therefore no money). All signs point to another Teledesic or Iridium.
[+] [-] vidanay|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blago|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mrep|7 years ago|reply
[0]: https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starlink-us-military-500-70...
[+] [-] AngryData|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] apatheticonion|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ncallaway|7 years ago|reply
55% of the human population currently live in cities. That means 45% don't live in cities.
45% of 7B is one hell of a TAM.
[+] [-] pbreit|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] BurningFrog|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hbcondo714|7 years ago|reply
https://finance.yahoo.com/video/elon-musk-raising-500m-satel...
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] s_y_n_t_a_x|7 years ago|reply
The problem with the current scenario is ISPs and wireless providers won't run lines or stand up towers for a low populated area. They know they won't ever make the money back for the project. With low orbit satellites this problem is solved. Would you rather those people live in the past just because they don't choose to live in the city?
[+] [-] nilskidoo|7 years ago|reply