18 ms·

> I don't understand the huge upside for Starlink outside of Africa or India, where they have <.1% the money to spend on such things. India is rapidly expandin

> I don't understand the huge upside for Starlink outside of Africa or India, where they have <.1% the money to spend on such things. India is rapidly expanding fiber internet connectivity, even in rural areas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharat_Broadband_Network https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharat_Broadband_Network In addition, 4G/5G coverage is extensive: https://www.ookla.com/articles/india-mobile-connectivity-1h2025 https://www.ookla.com/articles/india-mobile-connectivity-1h2... See India in this 5G global coverage map: https://www.ookla.com/articles/5g-map-2026 https://www.ookla.com/articles/5g-map-2026 The number of people who are not covered by above-mentioned fiber/cell network, and can afford Starlink as it is priced now, will be extremely small (likely making Starlink unviable as a profitable business).

Recurecur 2mo ago
We’ll how that prediction turns out… My informed opinion says that you are wildly wrong. (Also don’t forget the Starlink related military contracts that SpaceX has.)
- crossroadsguy 2mo ago
  > My informed opinion Well, my informed (I guess? it's first hand) opinion says exactly what the PC said. And no the plan has been underfoot for so long that it really pretty much has nothing to do with the current regime even though I am sure like any regime they'd say they did it from the scratch. I'd say we are getting really great at getting broadband to everyone than giving enough bread and education and healthcare to everyone :D (ignore the smiley, this sucks)
- Lomlioto 2mo ago
  We already have Starlink. Starlink only has 10 Million customers. Starlink increased prices just a fwe weeks ago. So whats stoping the future starlink explosion?
  - defrost 2mo ago
    > what[']s stop[p]ing the future Starlink explosion? Constellation numbers are still below the Kessler syndrome threshold?
enaaem 2mo ago
Additionally, India is currently banning starlink for national security reasons.
- inemesitaffia 2mo ago
  This isn't true
thatxliner 2mo ago
Starlink is currently partnering with United Airlines for Wi-Fi coverage, so that's one thing.
- dtagames 2mo ago
  Qatar just announced it's gate-to-gate and free on their aircraft.
- estearum 2mo ago
  Wifi on Delta has worked spectacularly well (not sarcastic) for like 10 years now. It's been broken/unavailable on maybe 6 of my flights out of hundreds.
deadbabe 2mo ago
Automated cargo ships. Traveling to automated ports.
- dopa42365 2mo ago
  The 5 wage slaves on current ocean giants aren't even a rounding error on any calculation.
  - deadbabe 2mo ago
    The wage isn’t the problem, it’s the regulations.
    - abeppu 2mo ago
      ... would there really not be regulations on giant unmanned ships? That seems concerning, though I could certainly understand international / maritime law having a gap.
      - FridgeSeal 2mo ago
        I give coastal piracy about 3-weeks to figure out how to commandeer unmanned cargo ships. I bet they’d be ecstatic.
        calvinmorrison 2mo ago
        taps head cant' steer without a helm
        Polizeiposaune 2mo ago
        you think they won't figure out how to hotwire the steer-by-wire controls?
        dryarzeg 2mo ago
oceanplexian 2mo ago
Starlink accounted for 69% of SpaceX revenue pre-merger and is speculated to be already profitable including launch costs. And this is all before they launch a phone or something, or replace global fiber interconnect with a lower latency space-based alternative, replace all forms of space based telecommunications (TV, Satellite Radio, etc). Starlink is a $1T+ business without even getting creative.
- nwah1 2mo ago
  For context, that revenue was $18.67 billion in 2025, with a net loss of $4.94 billion. And we must remember that 6G is in the final stages of development, which has peak speeds of 1 Tbps.
  - zdragnar 2mo ago
    6G will have worse physical penetration than 5G, which makes it worthless in rural areas where 5G is already severely inhibited by tree leaves.
    - markdown 2mo ago
      > in rural areas where 5G is already severely inhibited by tree leaves. This is not a problem in Africa and India.
      - ben_w 2mo ago
        You need an /s or a /jk or people will take you seriously. https://www.google.de/maps/place/Nairobi,+Kenya/@-1.2745409,36.8028116,3a,75y,145.58h,92.31t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sQBulD_Hw2fgAESsTmdi-KQ!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D-2.3111237906325073%26panoid%3DQBulD_Hw2fgAESsTmdi-KQ%26yaw%3D145.58426652960952!7i16384!8i8192!4m6!3m5!1s0x182f1172d84d49a7:0xf7cf0254b297924c!8m2!3d-1.2920659!4d36.8219462!16zL20vMDVkNDk!5m1!1e4?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDcwOC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D https://www.google.de/maps/place/Nairobi,+Kenya/@-1.2745409,...
darth_avocado 2mo ago
> The number of people who are not covered by above-mentioned fiber/cell network, and can afford Starlink as it is priced now, will be extremely small People vastly overestimate the purchasing power in places like India. Most of the purchasing power is concentrated in the top 1% of the population and most of that 1% lives in urban areas with fiber connectivity. The bottom 90% don’t even make $1K/person/year. Even a $10/month subscription (1/5th of what it costs right now) would be 10% of the total income, which at those income levels, would never be a priority.
- inglor_cz 2mo ago
  When I was a teenager in early post-Communist Czechia, Internet connection was also expensive. So what we did was that we pooled resources. Five or ten households had a common connection and shared it. I don't doubt that similar schemes will be used in Africa or India. BTW Median income in India is about $3K a year.
  - laughing_man 2mo ago
    That's exactly what's happening. Entire villages are sharing one connection.
    - yxhuvud 2mo ago
      That is great, but it also sets the stage for actual fiber to be drawn as it is vastly cheaper to connect to an existing end user network than to build it up from scratch. When a critical mass of villages have built internal networks it will be worth drawing cable for them as well. Lack of sufficient population density and political instability is what would stop this.
      - inemesitaffia 2mo ago
        Money
  - darth_avocado 2mo ago
stevep98 2mo ago
Global cellular operator revenue is approx $1T. They have put their toe in the water with direct-to-cellular support for starlink, and have bought spectrum to improve this. I'm sure they basically want to offer cellular to everyone in the world and get a good chunk of that $1T. Maybe they want 20% of it? Sounds crazy, but China Mobile, Verizon, and Deutsche Telecom each have 10%. Sounds it's not so wild that they can grab a big chunk, especially if they can find new customers that are not already connected. And of course they can also continue to grow their broadband internet access business. I suppose they will likely start putting cameras and other data sensors on the satellites so they can sell other data for mapping, positioning services, agriculture, weather, etc. The incremental cost to add this to the platform will be almost nothing compared to existing systems.
- jraby3 2mo ago
  This is the right answer. They are building their own cell phone network to compete with major carriers worldwide.
  - Lomlioto 2mo ago
    No they sell a story to investors. Right now we do not even have the antenna technology in current high end smartphones for 'easy to use, normal speed' mobile to satelite communication. And funny enough, the more local mobile phones you would have, which want to send data to a satelite, the harder the problem gets due to interference. With 5g we do already a lot of beam forming etc. Try beamforming into 500km space with uncoordinated random amount of mobile devices with very very little sending power and one satelite 'beamforming' its a few hundred square miles.
  - pyrale 2mo ago
    > to compete with major carriers worldwide. I don't see a reason why countries with existing carriers would allow that, given the owner's stance about political meddling.
- Lomlioto 2mo ago
  It will take years if not more to be technical capable to have modems so good that they can communicate with a starlink satelite in any reasonable 'day to day' way. And Starlink already increased prices again. And without Sparship and prooving that they actually can reuse it, they can't hold the price point. Starlink satelites do not scale very well. They need v3 and even with v3 this doesn't scale efficently.
JumpinJack_Cash 2mo ago
Space Bears have been saying this for quite a while, we live in megalopolis which already are covered very efficiently and we are only becoming more urban. Of course their voice was drowned because rockets are essentially giant penises piercing the atmosphere and hence the intersection of nerds getting excited for the sake of technical prowness and rich guys who don't get laid who seem to be nowadays at the helm of the intelligentia didn't want to hear none of that. On top of that add the reusability stunt streamed in 4k making them extrapolate a not well defined pivotal leap for ROI....and there you have it , it's the Apollo sinkhole all over again with money being lit on fire an essentially no quality of life ROI for society. At least the Apollo mission got us the ability to deliver nukes to Moscow in 30 minutes or less. This will be a total sinkhole. All the while we are held hostage by a Nation with consumption rates which are a thenth of ours and we still have the audacity to reject nuclear fission because it's "dangerous"
layla5alive 2mo ago
Starlink is going to be panopticon surveillance satellites long term - I hope I'm wrong.

Recurecur 2mo ago

We’ll how that prediction turns out… My informed opinion says that you are wildly wrong. (Also don’t forget the Starlink related military contracts that SpaceX has.)

crossroadsguy 2mo ago
> My informed opinion Well, my informed (I guess? it's first hand) opinion says exactly what the PC said. And no the plan has been underfoot for so long that it really pretty much has nothing to do with the current regime even though I am sure like any regime they'd say they did it from the scratch. I'd say we are getting really great at getting broadband to everyone than giving enough bread and education and healthcare to everyone :D (ignore the smiley, this sucks)
Lomlioto 2mo ago
We already have Starlink. Starlink only has 10 Million customers. Starlink increased prices just a fwe weeks ago. So whats stoping the future starlink explosion?
- defrost 2mo ago
  > what[']s stop[p]ing the future Starlink explosion? Constellation numbers are still below the Kessler syndrome threshold?

enaaem 2mo ago

Additionally, India is currently banning starlink for national security reasons.

inemesitaffia 2mo ago
This isn't true

thatxliner 2mo ago

Starlink is currently partnering with United Airlines for Wi-Fi coverage, so that's one thing.

dtagames 2mo ago
Qatar just announced it's gate-to-gate and free on their aircraft.
estearum 2mo ago
Wifi on Delta has worked spectacularly well (not sarcastic) for like 10 years now. It's been broken/unavailable on maybe 6 of my flights out of hundreds.

deadbabe 2mo ago

Automated cargo ships. Traveling to automated ports.

dopa42365 2mo ago
The 5 wage slaves on current ocean giants aren't even a rounding error on any calculation.
- deadbabe 2mo ago
  The wage isn’t the problem, it’s the regulations.
  - abeppu 2mo ago
    ... would there really not be regulations on giant unmanned ships? That seems concerning, though I could certainly understand international / maritime law having a gap.
    - FridgeSeal 2mo ago
      I give coastal piracy about 3-weeks to figure out how to commandeer unmanned cargo ships. I bet they’d be ecstatic.
      - calvinmorrison 2mo ago
        taps head cant' steer without a helm
        Polizeiposaune 2mo ago
        you think they won't figure out how to hotwire the steer-by-wire controls?
        dryarzeg 2mo ago

oceanplexian 2mo ago

Starlink accounted for 69% of SpaceX revenue pre-merger and is speculated to be already profitable including launch costs. And this is all before they launch a phone or something, or replace global fiber interconnect with a lower latency space-based alternative, replace all forms of space based telecommunications (TV, Satellite Radio, etc). Starlink is a $1T+ business without even getting creative.

nwah1 2mo ago
For context, that revenue was $18.67 billion in 2025, with a net loss of $4.94 billion. And we must remember that 6G is in the final stages of development, which has peak speeds of 1 Tbps.
- zdragnar 2mo ago
  6G will have worse physical penetration than 5G, which makes it worthless in rural areas where 5G is already severely inhibited by tree leaves.
  - markdown 2mo ago
    > in rural areas where 5G is already severely inhibited by tree leaves. This is not a problem in Africa and India.
    - ben_w 2mo ago
      You need an /s or a /jk or people will take you seriously. https://www.google.de/maps/place/Nairobi,+Kenya/@-1.2745409,36.8028116,3a,75y,145.58h,92.31t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sQBulD_Hw2fgAESsTmdi-KQ!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D-2.3111237906325073%26panoid%3DQBulD_Hw2fgAESsTmdi-KQ%26yaw%3D145.58426652960952!7i16384!8i8192!4m6!3m5!1s0x182f1172d84d49a7:0xf7cf0254b297924c!8m2!3d-1.2920659!4d36.8219462!16zL20vMDVkNDk!5m1!1e4?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDcwOC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D https://www.google.de/maps/place/Nairobi,+Kenya/@-1.2745409,...

darth_avocado 2mo ago

> The number of people who are not covered by above-mentioned fiber/cell network, and can afford Starlink as it is priced now, will be extremely small People vastly overestimate the purchasing power in places like India. Most of the purchasing power is concentrated in the top 1% of the population and most of that 1% lives in urban areas with fiber connectivity. The bottom 90% don’t even make $1K/person/year. Even a $10/month subscription (1/5th of what it costs right now) would be 10% of the total income, which at those income levels, would never be a priority.

inglor_cz 2mo ago
When I was a teenager in early post-Communist Czechia, Internet connection was also expensive. So what we did was that we pooled resources. Five or ten households had a common connection and shared it. I don't doubt that similar schemes will be used in Africa or India. BTW Median income in India is about $3K a year.
- laughing_man 2mo ago
  That's exactly what's happening. Entire villages are sharing one connection.
  - yxhuvud 2mo ago
    That is great, but it also sets the stage for actual fiber to be drawn as it is vastly cheaper to connect to an existing end user network than to build it up from scratch. When a critical mass of villages have built internal networks it will be worth drawing cable for them as well. Lack of sufficient population density and political instability is what would stop this.
    - inemesitaffia 2mo ago
      Money
- darth_avocado 2mo ago

stevep98 2mo ago

Global cellular operator revenue is approx $1T. They have put their toe in the water with direct-to-cellular support for starlink, and have bought spectrum to improve this. I'm sure they basically want to offer cellular to everyone in the world and get a good chunk of that $1T. Maybe they want 20% of it? Sounds crazy, but China Mobile, Verizon, and Deutsche Telecom each have 10%. Sounds it's not so wild that they can grab a big chunk, especially if they can find new customers that are not already connected. And of course they can also continue to grow their broadband internet access business. I suppose they will likely start putting cameras and other data sensors on the satellites so they can sell other data for mapping, positioning services, agriculture, weather, etc. The incremental cost to add this to the platform will be almost nothing compared to existing systems.

jraby3 2mo ago
This is the right answer. They are building their own cell phone network to compete with major carriers worldwide.
- Lomlioto 2mo ago
  No they sell a story to investors. Right now we do not even have the antenna technology in current high end smartphones for 'easy to use, normal speed' mobile to satelite communication. And funny enough, the more local mobile phones you would have, which want to send data to a satelite, the harder the problem gets due to interference. With 5g we do already a lot of beam forming etc. Try beamforming into 500km space with uncoordinated random amount of mobile devices with very very little sending power and one satelite 'beamforming' its a few hundred square miles.
- pyrale 2mo ago
  > to compete with major carriers worldwide. I don't see a reason why countries with existing carriers would allow that, given the owner's stance about political meddling.
Lomlioto 2mo ago
It will take years if not more to be technical capable to have modems so good that they can communicate with a starlink satelite in any reasonable 'day to day' way. And Starlink already increased prices again. And without Sparship and prooving that they actually can reuse it, they can't hold the price point. Starlink satelites do not scale very well. They need v3 and even with v3 this doesn't scale efficently.

JumpinJack_Cash 2mo ago

Space Bears have been saying this for quite a while, we live in megalopolis which already are covered very efficiently and we are only becoming more urban. Of course their voice was drowned because rockets are essentially giant penises piercing the atmosphere and hence the intersection of nerds getting excited for the sake of technical prowness and rich guys who don't get laid who seem to be nowadays at the helm of the intelligentia didn't want to hear none of that. On top of that add the reusability stunt streamed in 4k making them extrapolate a not well defined pivotal leap for ROI....and there you have it , it's the Apollo sinkhole all over again with money being lit on fire an essentially no quality of life ROI for society. At least the Apollo mission got us the ability to deliver nukes to Moscow in 30 minutes or less. This will be a total sinkhole. All the while we are held hostage by a Nation with consumption rates which are a thenth of ours and we still have the audacity to reject nuclear fission because it's "dangerous"

layla5alive 2mo ago

Starlink is going to be panopticon surveillance satellites long term - I hope I'm wrong.