{"id":17690,"date":"2025-09-12T09:01:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T09:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/17690\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T09:01:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T09:01:07","slug":"amazon-joins-spacex-in-satellite-internet-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/17690\/","title":{"rendered":"Amazon joins SpaceX in satellite internet race"},"content":{"rendered":"

CNBC’s Investing in Space newsletter offers a\u00a0view into the business of space exploration and privatization, delivered straight to your inbox.\u00a0Sign up to receive future editions.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Amazon logo for Project Kuiper is displayed on a mobile phone. <\/p>\n

Nurphoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images<\/p>\n

Overview: Amazon plays catch-up with SpaceX in satellite internet race<\/p>\n

Last month, the number of Amazon’s internet-beaming Kuiper satellites in orbit barely hit three digits. By last week, the world’s U.S. largest retailer was snatching its first contract to supply in-flight WiFi to an airline \u2014 many of which have already contracted to employ the rival services of SpaceX’s Starlink mega-constellation.<\/p>\n

There was always bound to be a first airline to make the jump to Amazon’s low Earth orbit satellite network and test out Project Kuiper’s pledge of fast, reliable connectivity. And JetBlue’s decision to tap the services\u00a0on select aircraft starting in 2027<\/a>\u00a0and improve on its Fly-fi in-flight WiFi perks still leaves Amazon with a wide gap to bridge in the catch-up with Starlink, whose airline customers include the likes of Virgin Atlantic, United Airlines and Air France.<\/p>\n

But Amazon’s fledgling triumph injects a fresh challenge in the satellite-powered internet market where SpaceX’s Starlink had increasingly emerged as a dominant player, despite some competition from Eutelsat’s OneWeb, China’s SpaceSat and Viasat. To be sure, Amazon’s Project Kuiper constellation is still in its early days, with a mere 102 satellites in orbit \u2014 a drop in the sea compared with the 1,600 units the Federal Communications Commission requires to be deployed by July 2026 and the 3,236 that Jeff Bezos’ company targets by July 2029. Kuiper’s numbers of active satellites dim even further, compared with the\u00a08,393 satellites<\/a>\u00a0that Starlink had in orbit as of Sept. 8, out of 12,000 spacecraft the company has been permitted to launch by the FCC under an initial approval.<\/p>\n

Suffice to say, Musk’s Starlink has the starting edge on scale, helped along by SpaceX’s considerable launch capacity. The company had impressively notched 100 Falcon 9 launches by the middle of August,\u00a0with 72 of these spaceflights<\/a>\u00a0carrying Starlink satellites. Meanwhile, it was only in January this year that Bezos’ Blue Origin undertook the maiden flight of the heavy-lift New Glenn, which was nonetheless commissioned for 12 Kuiper launches \u2014 with an option for another 15 \u2014\u00a0all the way back in 2022<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the interim, Amazon’s first Kuiper batches reached low orbit courtesy of the services of other commercial providers, such as United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket and \u2014 perhaps ironically,\u00a0given Musk and Bezos’ previous satellite feud<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 Space X’s Falcon 9. ArianeSpace also has a contract to perform 18 Kuiper launches, of which 16 to be carried out by an “advanced version” of the Ariane 64.<\/p>\n

There’s a reason why the satellite internet provision market is heating up. Global satellite operators have slated roughly 70,000 LEO satellite plans due to launch between 2025 and 2031,\u00a0according to a March report from Goldman Sachs<\/a>, whose Head of Greater China Technology Research Allen Chang at the time anticipates the “mainstream use case for satellite internet technology to be the upcoming 6G communications.” While the commercial rollout of 6G isn’t expected for at least another five years, a ramp-up of LEO satellite services is likely to benefit the\u00a0roughly 2.5 billion of people<\/a>\u00a0– or 30.5% of the world’s population \u2014 who lack internet access, along with users in remote, war-torn or sparsely populated regions.<\/p>\n

SpaceX isn’t sitting idle as Amazon prepares to enter the arena and supply customer services\u00a0by late 2025<\/a>. Just this week, the company agreed\u00a0a roughly $17 billion deal<\/a>\u00a0to buy Echostar’s wireless spectrum licenses and bolster Starlink’s 5G business, with SpaceX President and Chief Operating Officer Gwynne Shotwell\u00a0hailing the purchase<\/a>\u00a0on social media as another step “to advance our mission to end mobile dead zones everywhere on Earth!”<\/p>\n

What’s up<\/p>\n

Fate of costly SLS rocket under question\u00a0\u2014 As NASA’s tempestuous budget is about to be decided over the coming weeks, attention is turning to whether the cost-heavy SLS rocket \u2014 whose launches command a $4-billion price tag \u2014 will make the cut. \u2014\u00a0Ars Technica<\/a><\/p>\n

Space travel can expedite stem cell aging, study finds \u2014 Spaceflight can lead to astronauts’ bones losing density and prompt their genes to alter expression, with research now suggesting time spent in space accelerates aging tenfold. \u2014\u00a0NBC News<\/a><\/p>\n

NASA rover finds possible signs of life on Mars \u2014 A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance rover from the “Cheyava Falls” rock revealed biosignatures, which could hint at potential past life on the red plant. \u2014 Space & Defense<\/a><\/p>\n

Superfast electrons’ solar origins unveiled \u2014 The European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter has pinpointed two types of solar energetic electrons (SEE) with different sources in solar flares and coronal mass ejections. \u2014\u00a0European Space Agency<\/a><\/p>\n

Industry maneuvers<\/p>\n

U.S. losing space race to China because of Starship lags: Former NASA head \u2014 Former NASA chief Jim Bridenstine said the U.S. is falling behind Beijing in the space race because of ongoing delays with SpaceX’s Starship, which has been selected as a central part of the Artemis program to return U.S. astronauts to the Moon. \u2014\u00a0The Independent<\/a><\/p>\n

NASA targets multiple crewed space stations post-ISS era \u2014 NASA has put forward proposals for future manned stations followed the planned retirement of the International Space Station at the end of the decade. \u2014\u00a0Extreme Tech<\/a><\/p>\n

Space Force to deploy small satellites for GEO comms \u2014 The U.S. Space Force is now turning to small geostationary communications satellites under the Protected Tactical Satcom-Global (PTS-G) program. \u2014\u00a0Space News<\/a><\/p>\n

SpaceX Dragon capsule nudges ISS farther from Earth \u2014 A SpaceX Drago cargo capsule has boosted the International Space Station away from Earth, completing a key test. Visiting cargo spacecraft \u2014 historically Russia’s Progress spacecraft \u2014 typically push the ISS higher from the Earth’s orbit periodically, when the facility naturally falls back to the planet. \u2014\u00a0Space.com<\/a><\/p>\n

NASA bars Chinese nationals from working on its space programs \u2014 NASA had restricted Chinese citizens with U.S. visas from working on the space agency’s programs, amid a heating race between the two countries to reach the Moon. \u2014 Bloomberg<\/a><\/p>\n

Market movers<\/p>\n

SpaceX buys EchoStar’s wireless spectrum licenses \u2014 SpaceX will procure EchoStar’s wireless spectrum licenses in a $17 billion deal set to serve the expansion of the Starlink satellite network’s 5G connectivity abilities. \u2014\u00a0Reuters\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

SpaceTech Astradyne raises 2 million euros for space solar panels \u2014 Italy’s Astradyne clinched 2 million euros ($2.34 million) in a seed investment round led by Primo Capital through its Primo Space fund for the development of ultralight solar panels designed for use in space. \u2014\u00a0EU-Startups.com<\/a><\/p>\n

NordSpace to attempt Taiga launch by mid-September \u2014 NordSpace is hoping to achieve Canada’s first commercial space launch with the take-off of the Taiga rocket by the middle of this month. The company previously failed to lift off the rocket in August. \u2014\u00a0VOCM<\/a><\/p>\n

On the horizon<\/p>\n

Sept. 11 \u2014 Roscosmos’ Soyuz 2.1A to head out from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, with supplies for the International Space Station<\/p>\n

Sept. 12 \u2014 Roscosmos’ Soyuz 2.1B to depart Plesetsk, Russia, with the Glonass-K1 \u00a0navigation satellite<\/p>\n

Sept. 13 \u2014 SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to launch with Starlink satellites out of California<\/p>\n

Sept. 14 \u2014 SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to take off from Florida with the Cygnus NG-23 spacecraft with supplies to the International Space Station\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sept. 15 \u2014 China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation’s Long March 2C to leave with an unknown payload out of Jiuquan, China<\/p>\n

Sept. 17 \u2014 SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to depart with Starlink satellites out of California<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CNBC’s Investing in Space newsletter offers a\u00a0view into the business of space exploration and privatization, delivered straight to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[4562,553,111,139,69,147,392,4983,145],"class_list":{"0":"post-17690","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-breaking-news-technology","9":"tag-business-news","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-space","15":"tag-space-industry","16":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}