SpaceX has announced plans to make Starlink Mobile a "major mobile carrier in the US," citing two significant new developments. The company says Starlink Mobile may soon become a full-fledged carrier option for iPhone users.
The first milestone is a "nationwide low-band spectrum license portfolio." While Starlink Mobile's global 2 GHz mid-band spectrum will provide high-bandwidth capacity across the United States, the new low-band spectrum will offer a coverage layer. SpaceX says this layer helps its signal penetrate obstacles such as walls and reach customers' devices inside buildings. Notably, most existing mobile devices already support this underused band.
The second milestone is FCC approval for Starlink Mobile's Gen2 constellation application. Final approval for the low-band spectrum has not yet been granted, but SpaceX anticipates it will be and says it can move forward with deploying "a flexible architecture combining our satellite-to-mobile constellation in space with an advanced terrestrial deployment." The FCC has already approved the deployment of 15,000 satellites optimized for 2 GHz spectrum globally.
These V2 Starlink Mobile satellites deliver "more than 100 times" the bandwidth of the current generation, which should boost connection speeds worldwide. Together, the spectrum and satellite upgrades move Starlink Mobile closer to becoming a genuine alternative to traditional mobile carriers.
Source: 9to5Mac · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing