Tim Farrar

Consultant in satellite communications and wireless spectrum. I enjoy annoying billionaires, especially the "(Former) Trillionaire"

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

I've now released my new Starlink profile and forecasts for SpaceX's connectivity business, more details and an order form are in this blog post https://t.co/PXxcEYj1Nf

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@5Gto6G @LuckyStuey And of course when power is all important for AI compute, the AST design is completely unsuitable: the main solar arrays are on the back of the antenna, making it infeasible to point them directly towards the sun

[Space Investor @SpaceInvestor_D]

$BIII: Astrum Space plans to merge with Black Spade Acquisition III at a ~$1B equity valuation.

Astrum's GEO model is aimed at broadcasting emergency alerts, media, software and IoT data across entire countries.

• 25 MHz of scarce L-band spectrum
• GEO orbital rights at 105°E
• Asia-Pacific satellite-to-device coverage
• NEASTAR-1 launch targeted for 2028–29
• Up to $172.5M of SPAC cash before redemptions

[Stuart Taylor @LuckyStuey]

$ASTS what's not said in this post is more important than what is said:

- 53 days since the BB11 shipment to BB14 completion and the rest of batch "not far behind" = decelerating cadence.
- No launch date or vehicle announcement.
- BB11 status omitted entirely.

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@OptionTheorist I wouldn't necessarily say they overpaid relative to the certainty of an all-cash take-private transaction in the mid-$40 range. Despite the widened cap-collar range, there remains some downside risk to the $54 price inherent in the highly volatile RocketLab equity.

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

My new blog post on the Iridium-RocketLab deal and Viasat spectrum speculation https://t.co/LGgtwAOlBB

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@BellikOzan Yes. It's very impressive that Starlink costs have remained roughly equal between satellites and launch. But Amazon may end up paying more to launch each satellite than they cost to make, which is a bigger long term problem

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@bad_investor_ It is a strange situation right now. Things may become clearer at the Paris conference in a few weeks

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@100MBTC The question is ill-defined unless you specify a quantity, especially since your answer is dependent on significant returns to scale

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@FREESPEECH1017 I agree that SpaceX's strategy is presumably to wait out Jarvinian and fight if they ask for an extension and/or claim to have met the build out conditions

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

@FREESPEECH1017 Recall that TriStar only paid ~$6M for these licenses so they will certainly be cheap

[FREESPEECH101 @FREESPEECH1017]

🤣🤣🤣 SpaceX must have gotten this AWS 3-A1 spectrum for pennies from TriStar...

Released July 17, 2026 TriStar/Starlink Spectrum Holdings agree on transferring the 3 AWS-A1 FCC authorizations. (I posted this a week or so)

Well, the license was set to "automatically expire" due to failing to meet the 12 year buildout deadlines on July 05, 2026. So it appears there was some last minute "Take it or leave it" for Tristar.

I would expect similar deal going forward with Jarvinian/ 2014 AWS Bidco whose 12 year buildout deadlines expire December 1, 2026. Jarvinian/Terrestar paid nearly $300MM for the unpaired AWS-3 B1 licenses in 2014.

[Mike Dano @mikeddano]

All three big US FWA providers experienced a performance drop in both download and upload speeds between Q1 2026 to Q2 2026, which is likely due to the seasonal impact of foliage —dense leaves on trees can weaken FWA signals.
MORE: https://t.co/sagEPbS8sq

[SpaceX @SpaceX]

Introducing Starbase, Louisiana – a high-cadence launch site that will enable Starship to open a pathway to the stars for humanity.

Thank you to @LAGovJeffLandry and the great people of Louisiana for all of their support as we work together on this audacious project → https://t.co/zGKVOGSxfW

[Kiko Dontchev @TurkeyBeaver]

This morning’s @SpaceX mission from pad 40 was the last planned Falcon 9 Starlink launch from Florida (and it launched on the fleet leading booster!!), marking the end of an era for these launches on the East Coast. From here on, Starlink missions out of Florida will fly on Starship. The West Coast team will continue regularly launching Starlink from Vandenberg.

Super proud of this incredible team. You’ve made Falcon 9 the most reliable launch vehicle in history. You also helped build the largest low-Earth orbit satellite constellation providing connectivity to millions around the world, and you’ve set the foundation for what’s next.

In the last seven years, Falcon has flown ~260 Starlink missions from the Cape… can’t wait until we launch that and many more with Starship!

[Mike Dano @mikeddano]

"MobileX... currently has 107,000 paid subscribers, according to the FCC filing. By comparison, Boost Mobile, the mobile service run by Ergen-run EchoStar, ended Q2 with 7.38 million wireless subscribers."
https://t.co/Fz8uxSHakd
via @thebauminator

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

Is the free second terminal for Max users back too?

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

When did Starlink drop the $10 monthly terminal lease fee?

[Tren Griffin @trengriffin]

In the late 1990s Boeing presented a plan to build a network operations center for a LEO satellite constellation at a cost of $1 billion. The planned NOC could withstand a terrorist attack and included a day care center in the building. Now add the cost of for satellites/launch.

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

Even Aaron agrees that Musk was talking complete nonsense on the Q2 call...

[Aaron Burnett @aaronburnett]

Even in our relatively conservative estimates this “several times a week” cadence is achieved in late 2028 or early 2029 depending on if you define several as 3 or 4 times a week

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

But I thought Musk promised there would be daily Starship flights within 12 months, according to the Q2 results call? So Falcon 9 must be "winding down" early next year...

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

@CJHandmer @SciGuySpace @SpaceX Once Starship is flying reliably several times per week, it makes sense to shift super scarce SpaceX engineering and production resources to Starship to get launch rate to several times per day, which means winding down Falcon

[Tim Farrar @TMFAssociates]

The point of the femtocell reveal was to stop analysts from assuming SpaceX would pursue higher capex alternatives. It isn't working so far https://t.co/f2ppiYJfTM

[SpacBobby @SpacBobby]

$ASTS - UBS also chiming in on the challenges for SpaceX in competing against the big 3 U.S. carriers:

"Using this strategy to achieve the density necessary to replicate coverage of the 3 MNOs in urban centers is going to be difficult given the large number of MDUs typical of metropolitan areas. Large apartment buildings are an impediment to Starlink adoption as tenants generally do not have access to the building exterior to mount a terminal. Most new buildings use Low-E glass which reflects infrared and ultraviolet light while letting visible light pass through.

Almost 30% of Americans live in MDUs, making this portion of the market difficult to reach. Starry (and now Verizon) and other FWA carriers have pursued an MDU strategy where the provider effectively provisions the whole building with a centralized antenna and then installs each customer at the unit level when they subscribe. However, the key to successful consumer FWA strategies (including that of Starlink) to date is self- installation. Self-installation dramatically lowers SAC, minimizes the effective cost of churn and improves overall LTV per sub. A FWA MDU strategy in the U.S. hasn't worked to our knowledge."