In this new round-up, Via Satellite looks at recent research reports in the space and telecommunications arena. This installment features a look at the economics of the Starlink terminal, space investment activity in 2020, and In-Flight Connectivity (IFC) prospects. <\/i><\/p>\nNSR Questions Economics of Starlink User Terminal <\/b><\/h3>\n
In a recent research article, NSR<\/strong> analyst Lluc Palerm dug into the user terminal cost for SpaceX<\/strong>\u2019s Starlink Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) constellation, and what it means for the economics of Starlink compared to a Geostationary (GEO) broadband terminal. <\/p>\n A typical GEO consumer broadband terminal costs about $350 and contributes to only 14% of the total cost of ownership (TCO) for the system over three years. NSR puts the margin for GEO operators in the 35-40% range. <\/p>\n For Starlink, NSR used a low-range consensus estimate cost of $2,000 for the terminal, and estimates that the terminal is a substantially more 25% of the total cost of ownership for the system over three years. SpaceX will receive $885.5 million U.S. government subsidy for the first phase of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF), but even with government subsidies, NSR estimates Starlink would operate at a low 20% margin. \u201cEven with theoretically lower capacity prices and government subsidies, the still expensive LEO terminals challenge the economic feasibility of serving households from NGSO constellations,\u201d Palerm writes. <\/p>\n NSR acknowledges that we don\u2019t know the cost of the Starlink terminals, or how SpaceX will subsidize it for users (the cost in the beta program is $500), but the business case is challenging. In conclusion: \u201cSpaceX would need to rely on really high-end, bandwidth-hungry subscribers with significantly lower churn rates than the rest of the industry to amortize the cost of the terminal.\u201d<\/p>\n Seraphim Capital<\/strong>, one of the leading venture capital firms focused on space, reports in its Q4 SpaceTech Venture Capital Index for 2020 that deal volume remained level in 2020, but deal values spiked in the second half of the year, driven by mega deals like Relativity Space<\/b> and OneWeb<\/b>. Overall, Seraphim reports that 221 deals closed in 2020 compared to 219 in 2019. But the average deal size was $45 million, up from $27 million in 2019. The surge in mega deals drove up average deal sizes<\/p>\n In terms of geography for 2020, there was not much change over previous years. North America saw a modest increase in deals, and there were slight decreases in Asia and Europe. The United Kingdom is the primary market in Europe and accounts for 42% of all European deals. <\/p>\n Seraphim also pointed to the special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) announced for Momentus<\/b> and Seraphim portfolio company AST & Science<\/b> at the end of the year. The firm expects to see many more SPACs over the coming year \u2014 which has already begun to prove true with Rocket Lab<\/strong>, Spire<\/strong>, and BlackSky<\/strong> that have announced over the past two weeks. <\/p>\n \u201cWe expect 2021 to shape up to be yet another record year, albeit this will likely be driven in part by public markets given $1.34 billion of investment in space-related SPAC transactions has already been announced,\u201d the report says. <\/p>\n Valour Consultancy<\/strong>, which tracks the In-Flight Connectivity (IFC) market, has released a recent report in which it forecasts the number of aircraft installed with IFC will double from 9,026 at the end of 2020, to approximately 18,500 in 2029. These figures factor in the full impact of COVID-19, including the cancellation of retrofit projects and delayed deliveries of new aircraft.<\/p>\n Over the next two years, Valour predicts the installed base will grow slowly, by around 800 aircraft, marking a 70% decrease in net new installs across the period compared to pre-COVID-19 estimates. <\/p>\n \u201cThe pandemic is driving change in the passenger experience and many airlines are using this period to revisit their digital strategies. It\u2019s clear we\u2019re going to see a greater emphasis placed on contactless interactions, customer reassurance and the seamlessly digital journey. IFC can, at the very least, enhance many applications linked to these areas and, as a result, will become more integral to airlines than before the pandemic hit,\u201d Daniel Welch, co-founder of Valour Consultancy wrote.<\/p>\n Mark Holmes contributed to this article <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In this new round-up, Via Satellite looks at recent research reports in the space and telecommunications arena. This installment features a look at the economics of the Starlink terminal, space investment activity in 2020, and In-Flight Connectivity (IFC) prospects. NSR Questions Economics of Starlink User Terminal In a recent research article, NSR analyst Lluc Palerm […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":57773,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57957"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57773"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Seraphim Tracked Record Deal Values in Second Half of 2020<\/b><\/h3>\n
Valour Predicts Slow IFC Growth Over Next Two Years<\/b><\/h3>\n