[LargeTomato]

I read an analysis by Morgan Stanley that it costs $40B to launch the entire constellation. That doesn't include the cost of the satellite, just the launches.

According to SpaceX their satellites last 5 years. That means Starlink must make, at minimum, $8B/year to maintain the constellation.

`$8B/yr / ($200/mo * 12 mo) = 3.33 Million users`

3.3 million users paying $200/mo in order to break even. The starshield contract probably covers a good amount, too.

[montenegrohugo]

That's a number wrong by an order of magnitude - there's been 118 starlink launches (with many of those being rideshares).

Falcon 9 costs 67 million for external customers, for internal use the cost will likely be lower. Let's say 50. 50 * 118 gives us a HIGH estimate of 5.6 billion, but i'd expect it to be much closer to 3-4 b.

Satellites are relatively cheap. Total cost below 10b, certainly not 40b

[danpalmer]

This is break-even on just one cost aspect though. If you add satellites, bandwidth/internet connectivity (a significant portion of the cost to service a user for traditional ISPs), renting/maintaining ground stations, marketing, and eventually R&D/offices/etc, that all rapidly increases.

Additionally, $200/m is not price competitive compared to traditional ISPs in most of the world, $20-50 is more typical for many areas, less in Africa/Asia. Yes Starlink has a USP over traditional services, but that USP won't benefit users who are already well served by traditional ISPs, so to expand outside the remote market they will need to drop prices to compete.

The maths could easily end up being $12bn/year / ($30/mo * 12m) = 33.3 million users. Is that a reasonable goal? That's a lot of paying users. That's a 4% market share in Europe and the US where there are highly developed telcos with decades of experience in this. That's a hard one, particular to achieve it in the near term (~5 years or one replacement cycle).

[LargeTomato]

I should have been more clear. I agree with you 100%.

[inemesitaffia]

SpaceX has never raised or made up to 40 billion. It's not hard to estimate the cost of launch and figure out that headline number is wrong

[i67vw3]

Also, the business roaming plans used on airplanes, cargo ships are quite costly, I think around $2000/month.