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Starlink Maritime

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Re: Starlink Maritime

#331

Post by lxgr »

Mo3 wrote: post #250
lotsofpulp wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Iridium (and to some extent Inmarsat) are currently in an almost completely different market than Starlink is: They provide safety-of-life certified solutions for maritime, aviation and military customers.

I wouldn't be surprised if equipment and certification costs would dwarf the actual fee charged per month and user in these applications, and the market entry barrier in such highly regulated industries is usually enormous. (It took Iridium a long time to get SOLAS-certified, for example; before that, Inmarsat was the only solution besides HF radio.)

In the market of providing fast, non-safety-critical internet access to remote places however, my guess is that Starlink is going to shake up things significantly.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#332

Post by lxgr »

Mo3 wrote: post #274
lotsofpulp wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cannot agree with that characterization. How can a business be a suboptimal or undesirable investment because it does not earn enough profit relative to risk, and simultaneously be committing highway robbery (i.e. charging too high a price for its products/services)? If anything, it seems like the customers should feel lucky the investors are risking their money on this product/service, and it is being offered at a…

I think there's a misunderstanding. I noted that I wouldn't see these businesses as a good investment any more because of SpaceX and further developments. I believe they can still commit highway robbery even without their net margins being dramatically high, since highway robbery is exactly what you stated - charging too high a price for its products/services.

Charging "too high a price" is only possible in a monopoly position. Would you argue that any satellite provider has one, at the moment?

For high-bandwidth large-terminal, you have Inmarsat GX, Viasat and various other Ka and Ku band based providers; for safety of life you have Inmarsat and Iridium (except at the poles, where it's Iridium and HF); for land-based tracking, you have Globalstar and Iridium; for handheld telephony, you have Iridium, Inmarsat and Globalstar.

Notably, Starlink also does not look like it will be competing in any of these fields.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#333

Post by walrus01 »

jpgvm wrote: post #330
lxgr wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iridium was the first network to successfully operate inter-satellite links more than 20 years ago. I wouldn't call it "considerably less advanced". Iridium and Starlink operate in completely different bands (L vs Ka), with orders of magnitude more bandwidth available on Ka than on L. That (and the fleet size, which differs by 2-3 orders of magnitudes) is where the significantly lower bandwidth stems from.

Iridium was a marvel of engineering no-doubt but Starlink as a constellation is in a different league entirely. They also followed different engineering principles, Iridium was engineered to perfection while Starlink is hacked until it works and paper over the kinks with sheer scale and many iterations. Worth mentioning I have nothing but admiration for the original Iridium constellation, it was decades ahead of it's…

big difference also is that iridium was designed from the outset to address handheld size customer terminals like an original iridum 9505 phone, starlink is something that needs a considerably larger fixed phased array. rf laws of physics being what they are I don't see a ku/ka-band starlink handheld phone or anything similar to the iridium L/S-band hockey puck sized antennas any time soon.

the business model was clearly not the best, as witnessed by its spectacular bankruptcy, and the acquisition by the 2nd corporate incarnation of iridium.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#334

Post by lxgr »

jonah wrote: post #265
fshbbdssbbgdd wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Out of curiosity – why don't your parents use fixed 4G or 5G internet in that case?

Re: Starlink Maritime

#335

Post by lxgr »

NelsonMinar wrote: post #286
ww520 wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For latency and bandwidth, LEO beats GEO hands down.

They're really completely different product categories and shouldn't even be compared.

How so? Starlink seems extremely competitive in bandwidth and terminal size with Ka and Ku band GEOs, while blowing them out of the water when it comes to latency.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#336

Post by walrus01 »

lxgr wrote: post #331
Mo3 wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Iridium (and to some extent Inmarsat) are currently in an almost completely different market than Starlink is: They provide safety-of-life certified solutions for maritime, aviation and military customers. I wouldn't be surprised if equipment and certification costs would dwarf the actual fee charged per month and user in these applications, and the market entry barrier in such highly regulated industries is usually…

Large and serious budget offshore applications these days will of course have an Iridium terminal live and on the network, and also a geostationary based VSAT of some sort. Something such as Starlink is meant to take market share from the VSAT.

In some cases it might pay for itself in less than 1 month of service compared to the $/Mbps from the VSAT, using antenna hardware such as this and various vendors' choices of modems (and 3rd party VSAT ISPs that resell transponder kHz and operate teleports).

https://orbit-cs.com/maritime-satcom

Go price what it would cost for 1:1 dedicated monthly recurring billing to have 5 Mbps down x 1 Mbps up DIA service assigned to a medium sized maritime VSAT terminal that roams around the Gulf of Texas... Or even in a 5:1 or worse contended network.

What you'll see is the Iridium of course remains live and on the network and is used for critical voice calls and message and such, while the data network on the ship/offshore oil rig/whatever has a new better DIA path via starlink.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#337

Post by lxgr »

yardie wrote: post #59
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…

Iridium Go is designed to hit a price point. Whats the cheapest way to get data out in the middle of the Atlantic and is basically plug and play. It has leapfrogged SSB packet radio as the preferred, low cost data service. Also data is not charged in minutes, it's theoretically unlimited. The voice plans are charged in minutes and I don't think worth it. Just like the RO water-makers in the past, I believe this is th…

> Also data is not charged in minutes, it's theoretically unlimited.

I'd argue it is inherently very limited – 2.4 kbit/s is really not a lot, even sustained over a whole month ;)

Re: Starlink Maritime

#338

Post by walrus01 »

lxgr wrote: post #332
Mo3 wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a misunderstanding. I noted that I wouldn't see these businesses as a good investment any more because of SpaceX and further developments. I believe they can still commit highway robbery even without their net margins being dramatically high, since highway robbery is exactly what you stated - charging too high a price for its products/services.

Charging "too high a price" is only possible in a monopoly position. Would you argue that any satellite provider has one, at the moment? For high-bandwidth large-terminal, you have Inmarsat GX, Viasat and various other Ka and Ku band based providers; for safety of life you have Inmarsat and Iridium (except at the poles, where it's Iridium and HF); for land-based tracking, you have Globalstar and Iridium; for handheld…

> Iridium (except at the poles, where it's Iridium and HF)

a note that part of the DoD iridium market where Iridium was previously the only ultra-high-latitude/polar coverage part is served by the DoD's own molniya orbit satellites which provide full polar coverage. the orbits of these are designed to be at apogee and long dwell time directly above high latitudes.

the DoD is still a big part of iridium's revenue stream in general of course.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#339

Post by lxgr »

walrus01 wrote: post #202
dweekly wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget Inmarsat. https://www.inmarsat.com/en/solutions-services/maritime/serv... Or Globalstar. https://www.globalstar.com/en-us/blog/articles/satellite-sol...

globalstar is a bad joke and not a viable option for maritime services (or over-ocean aviation services) because unlike iridium or inmarsat, its satellite terminal-to-earth-station architecture is a bent pipe. there is zero globalstar mid ocean coverage. there is a reason you will see lots of competing options for people integrating the iridium embedded modems into things designed to go on top of $40 million business…

Is Iridium really competitive for business jets? The bandwidth of even their next-generation satellites does not seem competitive with the GEOs, and I'd guess bizjets should be mostly fine with their latitude limitations.

I'd expect most of them to go with one of the Ka band these days; they have pretty small antennas available these days as far as I know.

Re: Starlink Maritime

#340

Post by InvaderFizz »

walrus01 wrote: post #266
lotsofpulp wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I did the same as soon as Starlink launched. I saw it as an existential threat it is to all the Geo operators.

I was headhunted for a SRE position with Viasat last year due to my extensive Satcom background. I noped out as soon as I found out it was Viasat. Not because I dislike them personally, but because I don't want to be laid off next year.

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