Rocket technology itself is so intensely regulated by US export control laws that it’s practically impossible to develop an orbital launch vehicle without being a US- or Europe-registered company.
It is a real shame. It also looks like a lot of engineering work is shifting away from NZ — Auckland seems to be focusing more on operations and space systems, and the launch stuff is moving to the US with Neutron.
Also, RocketLab builds their own sats and can add the Iridium constellation replacements to their order book. It's a win-win. A smart move by Peter Beck and his team.
If it is still pole-to-pole global monolithic coverage, than hardware/legacy-protocols are of secondary interest. Modern SDR transceivers with proper RF beam-steering front-ends could retrofit the business while slowly phasing out legacy hardware.
But I do agree, Iridium was too pricey for most consumer product markets, and there were several other satellite broadband services.
Additionally, Starlink Direct to Cell (VoLTE) service now leverages global cellphone client infrastructure. It would be extremely foolish to compete with something proprietary. =3
Who will create the first advertisement in space using satellites as pixels to create their company logo? Maybe they can add some color and animations for kicks.
Edit: Another note on space junk is the effect on our atmosphere with all the "burning-up" of various materials. Apparently they don't just completely vaporize, but instead leave behind micro particles that float around for a long time. People are studying this and hopefully raising appropriate alarms (Making the case for wood satellites).
Here is the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLjW6zuYmos
How much market is there for people that just want low speed connectivity from the middle of nowhere?
There are a lot of folks out there that are overly cynical and so they'll just write things like the OP from time to time which just don't make much sense or have much to do with how the real world works. What's more interesting is looking at or trying to understand strategically why Rocket Lab is making this move, especially if you are an investor.
Iridium market cap was 5.5b and this transaction values it at 8b.
Why was Amazon valued at billions while making zero profit?
The stock market prices companies by many factors, revenue and profit are factors but so is growth.
Utilities companies make lots of profits but they are valued badly because they don’t grow at all!
Markets are forward looking and space is seen as a huge growth driver for the future, also RocketLab has been growing their top line revenue massively over the last few years.
But RocketLab did have five years of strong revenue growth. And they have a lower PS ratio than SpaceX. So at least compared to industry-rivals the valuation is justified
Iridium's revenue is larger, and I wouldn't think they'd be losing money.
But apparently you can buy things with promises (if you're in the right club, of course).
People do this all the time, that's how they buy their first house (or at least used to...). Your net worth is basically zero beyond what you saved for the down payment, but the bank advances you the money to buy the house because it believes your future income streams will allow you to pay the principal plus an interest.
So guess NASA told Rocket that if they want American contracts, they need to move?
https://qz.com/794101/elon-musk-explains-why-he-doesnt-hire-...
everfrustrated•2h ago
espadrine•1h ago
They are late compared to SpaceX, to be sure: 150 launches per year, 2400 satellites manufactured per year, $3K/kg operational with F9, target $200/kg in development with Starship.
panick21_•47m ago
Lets see their reliability when they have a bigger rocket and if they can land reliably. Because their rocket will be quite expensive to build.
schainks•28m ago
https://rocketlabcorp.com/updates/victus-haze/
Symmetry•1h ago
NetMageSCW•1h ago
hobonation•48m ago
amluto•25m ago
I don’t think there a unified “market” here. The fixed rooftop terminals and fixed-ish roaming terminals use high (tens of GHz) frequencies with correspondingly wide bandwidth, have excellent beamforming capabilities and some degree of MIMO to improve spectrum reuse, and consume an amount of power that would be outrageous for a phone. Phones don’t have reliably clear views of the sky and have much weaker RF capabilities.
Oh, and phones are well served by existing 4G and 5G networks in dense areas, with better spectrum reuse than seems practical for a satellite constellation.
I expect that we will actually see two separate markets that happen to share the same satellites and backhaul.
piltdownman•6m ago
You mean like the ASTS/Vodafone partnership that birthed the Satellite Connect Europe?
https://www.vodafone.com/news/newsroom/technology/satellite-...
https://www.vodafone.com/news/newsroom/technology/vodafone-a...
Or like the US JV where they provide the infra for AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon.
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260513491108/en/AST...
//Phones don’t have reliably clear views of the sky and have much weaker RF capabilities.
And they appear to have circumvented that, although ease of scaling remains to be seen.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ASTSpaceMobile/comments/1k6whtf/rak...
wongarsu•1h ago
davidpapermill•59m ago
Given the timing, this seems like a risky move as they'll be issuing debt in mid-2027 to refinance the bridge, at a time the market could be saturated / corrected.
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/rocket-lab-bu...