· x report
Rocket Lab Bids $8B for Iridium to Challenge SpaceX | KeepTrack X Report
Rocket Lab announced an $8B deal to acquire Iridium's 66-satellite LEO network, directly challenging SpaceX's Starlink with 10,706 working satellites.
Tag: satellite-communications
-
-
The $1.5 Million Starlink Jammer That Ukraine Keeps Blowing Up
Russia's Volna Kupol Garant electronic warfare system was purpose-built to jam Starlink. It costs around $1.5 million per unit, covers just 20 square kilometers, and can only target one satellite at a time. Ukraine has been finding and destroying them within days of deployment.
-
The Satellites the Size of a Studio Apartment
AST SpaceMobile's BlueBird constellation is a bet that raw aperture size wins. Each satellite unfolds a 64-square-meter phased-array antenna in orbit, the largest commercial antenna ever deployed. The company claims a stock smartphone on the ground can connect directly to it. The competition says the physics doesn't support that. Seventeen satellites in and a contract with AT&T, Verizon, and Vodafone, somebody's math is wrong.
-
Ka-Band
The high-frequency slice of the radio spectrum where modern broadband satellites live - narrow beams, fast data, and the inconvenient habit of being absorbed by rain.
-
Your Phone Already Talks to Space
SpaceX quietly built the world's largest 4G network without a single cell tower. Over 650 satellites now connect standard smartphones directly from orbit, and most people carrying compatible phones don't know the service exists.
-
C-Band
The workhorse frequency band that quietly powers satellite communications, weather radar, and Wi-Fi around the world