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Starlink Maritime

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Re: Starlink Maritime

#261

Post by roflyear »

dieselgate wrote: post #36
extheat wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think running Starlink is cheap? Something seems to have struck a nerve.

It’s only five boat units a month and ten boat units for setup. It’s no where near worth it for me because normal phone/wireless data works well where I sail (in addition to iridium network fwiw) - the prices would need to be at least an order (orders) of magnitude cheaper for me to even consider it. Not sure about parent comment though. Boat ~~ bust out another thousand Edit: I took parent comment as a joke but ya n…

Right. I'm going to get a go I guess for passage making. Oh well!

Re: Starlink Maritime

#262

Post by Dylan16807 »

notahacker wrote: post #38
ok_dad wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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

Commercial and military vessels have contracts with Iridium/Inmarsat etc for mission critical stuff. An extra box which based on current coverage map provides GSM level coast-only coverage of unproven reliability doesn't hold much appeal, even factoring in how expensive satellite broadband is.

> based on current coverage map

Well that's the least important analysis compared to looking at what should be available in a year.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#263

Post by lotsofpulp »

walrus01 wrote: post #253
lotsofpulp wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iridium’s profit margins do not seem like those of a company engaging in artificial highway robbery: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/IRDM/iridium-commu... Neither do Viasat’s: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/VSAT/viasat/profit... For some reason, Inmarsat has very nice profit margins though: https://craft.co/inmarsat/metrics Interesting that Viasat was able to purchase Inmarsat given the figures.

Viasat while it has a lot of consumer facing exposure (and contracts to do things like build teleports for the DoD) is not a major player in the market of actually owning geostationary satellites. Look at entities like Intelsat and SES.

Intelsat’s numbers look horrible, and Wikipedia says they recently filed for bankruptcy:

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/INTEQ/intelsat-sa/...

SES SA is doing well, but only a couple years of data:

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/SGBAF/ses-sa/profi...

Re: Starlink Maritime

#264

Post by roflyear »

maccam94 wrote: post #211
tsimionescu wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've launched satellites that have lasers, but I don't think they've actually demonstrated they have the ability to aim those lasers precisely enough to actually communicate between satellites in orbit.

https://wccftech.com/spacex-starlink-satellite-laser-test/

Lasers require a lot of power. I doubt this is going to work.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#265

Post by jonah »

fshbbdssbbgdd wrote: post #238
aml183 wrote: post #164

I work in the space industry and follow SATCOM closely. This is a very competitive space. Companies like Viasat, Iridium and Inmarsat already work in this vertical. SpaceX beats all these companies from a marketing perspective, but the big question is will a LEO operator provide better coverage than a GEO operator?

I’ve done work video calls using my friend’s starlink wifi on a remote mountain, and it’s unlimited bandwidth so this didn’t cost anything beyond the flat $110 monthly fee. Are geosynchronous services even capable of doing the bandwidth and latency needed for a two-way video call? And if so, how much would it cost?

Yes, they can do it - my parents have Hughes satellite internet. I've been able to do multi-person video calls from their house. It's pretty low bandwidth though 40Mbps or so claimed I think and something like 50Gb/Month data cap.

It was faster and cheaper to tether to my cell phone while working from their house.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#266

Post by walrus01 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #263
walrus01 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Viasat while it has a lot of consumer facing exposure (and contracts to do things like build teleports for the DoD) is not a major player in the market of actually owning geostationary satellites. Look at entities like Intelsat and SES.

Intelsat’s numbers look horrible, and Wikipedia says they recently filed for bankruptcy: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/INTEQ/intelsat-sa/... SES SA is doing well, but only a couple years of data: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/SGBAF/ses-sa/profi...

Several years ago I ensured that nothing in my 401k and other retirement savings plans has any exposure to geostationary owner stock.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#267

Post by paranoidrobot »

firekvz wrote: post #248
cptaj wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Normal satellite TV services work by restricting the area the signal is broadcast to. It has limitations on how precise it can be, and the receiver is pretty much passive.

Starlink is an active two-way system. Not only are they using high precision beam guidance on both ends, the receiver also has a GPS antenna and will report it's location back to the network.

Starlink is capable of turning off groundstations that are not where they're supposed to be. Not only capable, but for 'fixed location' groundstations (i.e normal service), they actually do block service if you move too far from where your assigned service area is.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#268

Post by [deleted] »

CodeWriter23 wrote: post #176
Someone1234 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iridium Go is 2.4 Kbits/s compared with 350 Mbps here, and data is charged in minutes (i.e. the slower/worse the connection the more it costs). Apples and oranges. Iridium GO is cheap, but that's all you can really say positively about it. It is arguably not even offering "internet" in the normal sense, since loading a website would be incredibly expensive/bad and is therefore restricted to low data rate messaging an…

Any given ship in the shipping industry probably burns that in fuel per day. Or half day. I think the value proposition is in line. I'll admit it seems expensive from the perspective of our dream sail around the world whilst coding and collecting benjamins from various hustles.

[deleted]

Re: Starlink Maritime

#269

Post by [deleted] »

dreamcompiler wrote: post #124
BurningFrog wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That might mean that they plan to enable inter-satellite links then? Or maybe they'll have stationary ships with "ground"-stations until the inter-satellite thing is working.

That wouldn't solve the problem. Those ships would still need a backhaul.

[deleted]

Re: Starlink Maritime

#270

Post by Dylan16807 »

mdasen wrote: post #102
cjensen wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do install normal starlink on boats [1]. The $10K/$5K price tag really has me scratching my head about what they are thinking. Does look like they plan to cover the entire ocean, so at least there is a specific benefit they can point to. They're definitely giving up a lot of everyday coastal business in hopes of making it up with a few whales. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHHCK6aARn0

I think Starlink is looking for more money. They've raised prices on everyone 11% after about a year. They've introduced Starlink RV at a 23% premium over their regular Starlink service (and a 36% over the original Starlink price point). I think Starlink doesn't want to use too heavy a hand with customers using their equipment not as intended (as is the case with most companies), but it does look like they're trying…

> I'd also note that it's likely that the equipment is a lot better to withstand the motion and environment of being at sea. These are going to have to withstand a lot of salt-water air and spray while maintaining their motors in good working order. They'll probably also need to be rated for a longer lifespan given the amount of movement the motors will be doing compared to a stationary one (not just the travel of the vessel, but also the waves).

The dish cost has some good engineering explanations.

The 40-50x service cost increase, at least in territorial waters, is all about competition.

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