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Starlink Maritime

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Re: Starlink Maritime

#241

Post by jpgvm »

Mo3 wrote: post #197
walrus01 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would ask two things: a) if you've ever personally lived for months or years at a time 100% dependent upon geostationary based services costing anywhere from $165/mo to $15,000 a month or more, for internet access and links to the outside world b) if you've personally used a starlink terminal the actual coverage isn't there yet for things like mid ocean, because starlink satellites in the present architecture need…

You are absolutely spot on. The market isn’t competitive, it’s artificial highway robbery to even be in business. The entry requirements and expenses are insanely high, preventing a lot of competition to begin with, and the few players are free to drive up their prices to disgusting altitudes while providing services of disgusting quality. I wouldn’t even be surprised if they have agreements going on between themselv…

The problem is actually that most of those systems are on considerably less advanced tech than Starlink and as a result only have a fraction of the capacity.

Thus each piece of capacity costs more.. thus the very high costs of Iridium and Viasat.

Their profit margins aren't actually that good because their costs are so high compared to their capacity and the costs are so high that demand simply doesn't materialise - people just do without.

Starlink will change this game because of their drastically increased capacity (assuming they get sat-sat links working). Until another mega-constellation comes online I fully expect them to do to satellite Internet what they did to the launch market.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#242

Post by vardump »

foobiekr wrote: post #58
ortusdux wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The majority of their satellites just bounce the signals back down to a nearby ground station. Their version 1.5 sats, which they started launching about a year ago, include laser links to allow sat->sat communication. Their plan is for the remaining 3/4th of their fleet to have laser links. One interesting side-effect of the laser links is that they can open up connections between stock exchanges and trading houses…

Predictability and stability count a lot as well. I think the starlink-as-low-latency-trading-medium is sort of like "blockchain for real estate" - it's not actually a real thing.

You can simply use multiple links to send same data. The fastest one wins, so if there's a temporary hickup on one of the links, you still get somewhat bounded latency. When things work fine, you get to reap the latency benefit.

So I think it's plausible for intercontinental links.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#243

Post by Mo3 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #240
Mo3 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue that 25% or so net margin for a decade is a pretty significant sign considering how small their customer base must be and how much expenses they must have. But yes, I did in fact assume it to be higher.

I see a lot of volatility for Iridium with quite a few years with big losses and zero profit. Viasat simply has near zero profit margins, and quite a few years with losses. Inmarsat looks like it has 20% or so profit margin for the last few years, but I could not quickly find more years of data. Also, I would expect decent (10%+) profit margins for a business with few customers and extremely costly barriers to entry.…

Iridium apparently had much more expenses for a few years around 2018, possibly mass upgrading their infrastructure, but before that a decade of near constant 20-30% net, recovering again now, unless I'm misreading this data.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#244

Post by Johnny555 »

aerovistae wrote: post #178

$5000 a month? Who is this for? I'm a little confused. Seems like even the military would be reluctant at that price point, let alone private boat owners who aren't multimillionaires.

While I agree that the military would be unlikely to use this civilian service on warships, it's not because of the price where $5000 would be a rounding error in the operational cost of the ship.

I see this more for commercial operators, like the Ferry between Seattle and Victoria BC - they could sell high speed internet for $10/trip and make a profit if they can sell it to 500 passengers/month.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#245

Post by xeromal »

ok_dad wrote: post #28
yardie wrote: post #27

"$5,000/mo with a one-time hardware cost of $10,000 for two high performance terminals." Definitely aimed at the champagne caviar, St Barts crowd rather than the hard scrabble, cruiser on a fixed income. In other terms, Iridium Go is still the best value around and truly global for the time being.

> Definitely aimed at the champagne caviar, St Barts crowd rather than the hard scrabble, cruiser on a fixed income. More like: commercial and military vessels

I feel like cruise ships will use this a lot. They're one of the last things on the planet that don't have cell service or internet that isn't 25$ a minute.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#246

Post by lotsofpulp »

Mo3 wrote: post #243
lotsofpulp wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see a lot of volatility for Iridium with quite a few years with big losses and zero profit. Viasat simply has near zero profit margins, and quite a few years with losses. Inmarsat looks like it has 20% or so profit margin for the last few years, but I could not quickly find more years of data. Also, I would expect decent (10%+) profit margins for a business with few customers and extremely costly barriers to entry.…

Iridium apparently had much more expenses for a few years around 2018, possibly mass upgrading their infrastructure, but before that a decade of near constant 20-30% net, recovering again now, unless I'm misreading this data.

The Mar 31, 2022 datapoint is -0.21%.

They do make a good profit in the years they do, but my point is they also have quite a bit of volatility. I would not touch that business without the 10%+ profit margin opportunities.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#247

Post by notahacker »

infogulch wrote: post #170
bradrydzewski wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a matter of perspective. I founded a company that sold b2b software and experimented with removing pricing from my website. The challenge is the cost to complete each sale was highly variable which made it difficult to advertise fixed pricing. Consider the following: If the buyer is an enterprise they expect a discount. The buyer may require the seller to use a supplier management tool like Arriba whi…

Honest Pricing/Licensing Plans Personal | Business | Enterprise $5/user/month | $8/user/month | $8/user/month | | + $200/hour custom license business development rate Features | Features++ | Features++

I take it you haven't sold to enterprise customers...

Re: Starlink Maritime

#248

Post by firekvz »

cptaj wrote: post #222
jwagenet wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call me confused, but if these satellites are not geostationary, why are the both the inland coverage and coastal coverage mostly limited to political boundaries? Shouldn't coverage be available anywhere there are satellites overhead?

Like other mention, its regulatory. But its also related to groundstations, the satellites bounce the signal down to land. They're transitioning to satellites with the capability to network between themselves which will reduce the need for groundstations. I don't know how much they really limit coverage due to borders. Like if you get one in colombia and just move it to venezuela, does it still work? They dont have p…

My family is using a directv antena bought in colombia and paying service in colombia, in Venezuela, so I'm pretty sure the market will try to do that as soon as they lunch in colombia

Re: Starlink Maritime

#250

Post by Mo3 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #246
Mo3 wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iridium apparently had much more expenses for a few years around 2018, possibly mass upgrading their infrastructure, but before that a decade of near constant 20-30% net, recovering again now, unless I'm misreading this data.

The Mar 31, 2022 datapoint is -0.21%. They do make a good profit in the years they do, but my point is they also have quite a bit of volatility. I would not touch that business without the 10%+ profit margin opportunities.

Definitely agree, I probably wouldn't touch them at this point any more at all.

Was just replying to the notion that this couldn't be artificial highway robbery just because their net margin isn't great. I believe it definitely still can be, because apparently the only way these companies are even in business right now is exactly by highway robbery.

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