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Estimates for the satellite dish from people in the industry are well over $1000 (see e.g. [1] https://spacenews.com/news-analysis-spacex-has-a-lot-riding-...)

Unless SpaceX has made a huge unannounced breakthrough in phased arrays they're actually taking large losses on the up-front cost at this point.



Dead industry projects incompetence onto disruptive newcomer, news at 10.

More seriously, the phased array antennas seem to be a big part of Starlink’s innovation. Launching tons of satellites cheaply by itself isn’t a super protected moat because if they block competitors from using the launch platform at a reasonable price, they risk antitrust action.


I don't see antitrust legislation being a real factor to anyone. Several companies have gone trillion dollar market valuation and several decades without such action. Even if Microsoft had a crystal ball of the future legislation when they were starting up they probably wouldn't have changed a thing. Antitrust in modern history is a thing without teeth when used and almost never used.

(I say this as someone who 100% wants market regulation that actually reinforces the natural market efficiencies - including sane, forceful antitrust legislation.)


> don't see antitrust legislation being a real factor to anyone.

You’ll suddenly see it change when it’s a powerful company (Amazon) upset that they get boxed out of the only US launch platform.


They should buy Ubiquity and build extant mesh networks...




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