Astronomy Prints 🌌: 💰 SpaceX's Starlink set for $6.6 billion revenue

A SpaceNews daily newsletter | Friday, May 10, 2024

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SpaceX is making money on Starlink today even as it continues to build out the constellation. A financial model of Starlink developed by Quility Space and discussed in a webinar Thursday calculated that SpaceX will generate $6.6 billion in revenue from Starlink this year, enough to generate positive free cash flow even when accounting for the costs to build and launch satellites. Starlink has 2.7 million subscribers and is growing in 75 countries, making inroads primarily in wealthier markets as a "rich world service" rather than bridging the divide in developing countries. SpaceX is able to keep its costs down through aggressive vertical integration and high-volume production. [SpaceNews]

Space propulsion company Avio is relying more on defense business during a lull in launches. The company reported this week net revenues of 78.8 million euros ($85 million) in the first quarter of 2024, a 32% increase from the same quarter a year ago. That increase was driven by increased work in defense markets, producing solid motors for missiles, while revenue from its work on Ariane 6 and Vega C remained flat. Avio said in an earnings call Thursday it is planning a test of a redesigned motor for the second stage of the Vega C later this month, keeping that vehicle on track for a return to flight by the end of the year. Avio also expects Ariane 6, whose solid rocket boosters are built by Avio, to make its debut in July. [SpaceNews]

Redwire Space has unveiled a second satellite platform for very low Earth orbit (VLEO) applications. The company said in an earnings call Thursday it is now offering Phantom, a bus developed by its European subsidiary initially for ESA's Skimsat mission. Phantom is separate from SabreSat, a VLEO spacecraft announced by Redwire earlier this year, with different technologies and capabilities. Company executives argued that VLEO offered Redwire a "leap-ahead opportunity" as it seeks to become more of a prime contractor. The company reported a fifth consecutive quarter of revenue growth and positive adjusted EBITDA. [SpaceNews]

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) will provide a space imaging payload on an upcoming responsive space mission. The Victus Haze mission will include an advanced optical payload from LLNL on a spacecraft being built by Rocket Lab. That payload features a monolithic telescope built from a single piece of fused silica. Versions of the payload have flown previously, including on the GEOStare2 mission, but the one for Victus Haze will use a different design. [SpaceNews]

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Other News

SpaceX launched a set of Starlink satellites overnight after a one-day delay. The Falcon 9 lifted off at 12:30 a.m. Eastern from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California and placed 20 Starlink satellites into orbit. The launch was scheduled for Wednesday night but scrubbed for undisclosed reasons. The 20 Starlink satellites on this launch included 13 with direct-to-cell payloads. [Noozhawk]

The Pentagon has worked with SpaceX to reduce unauthorized use of Starlink by the Russian military. John Plumb, assistant secretary of defense for space policy, said in an interview that the Defense Department, in cooperation with SpaceX and the Ukrainian government, has "successfully countered" Russian use of Starlink. He did not go into details about how they stopped use of Starlink by the Russian military. Some members of Congress had raised concerns that the Pentagon and SpaceX were not doing enough to counter Russian efforts, using terminals obtained on the black market, to use Starlink in occupied Ukraine. [Bloomberg]

Debris that fell on a Canadian farm may have come from a Dragon spacecraft. Farmers found several pieces of debris, one of which was a large object weighing about 45 kilograms and made of carbon fiber and aluminum honeycomb material. The objects may be debris from the trunk of the Crew Dragon spacecraft flown on the Ax-3 private astronaut mission. That trunk, jettisoned before the capsule returns to Earth, reentered over Saskatchewan in February. [CTV]

A severe solar storm may produce auroral displays across much of the continental United States tonight. NOAA issued Thursday a warning for a geomagnetic storm rated four on a scale of one to five, the first storm to be rated a four since 2005. NOAA predicts that could result in aurora visible as far south as northern California and Alabama. Viewing the aurora requires clear, dark skies. The storm is linked to an active period of solar activity as the sun reaches the peak of its 11-year cycle. [Washington Post]

The National Science Foundation is putting plans for an astronomical facility in Antarctica on ice. The project, called CMB-S4, would have developed microwave telescopes to study the cosmic microwave background left over from the Big Bang to see if the early universe went through a sudden expansion called inflation. However, at a meeting this week, an NSF official said the agency could not afford the $900 million project now given the need to upgrade infrastructure at its South Pole facilities. The announcement took many astronomers by surprise, given that CMB-S4 was highly ranked in an astrophysics decadal survey as well as a similar long-term plan in particle physics. [Science]

Wizard Wrangler

"When I characterize NASA, and I think you would too, is that NASA is made up of a bunch of wizards, and Pam [Melroy] and I just have the privilege of trying to keep all these wizards going in the right direction."

– NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, speaking this week at a meeting of the NASA Advisory Council.