/sci/ - Science & Math

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/18/investing-in-space-where-spacexs-starlink-is-growing-market-share.html

> Just over two and a half years after SpaceX’s Starlink first rolled out its beta service, the satellite internet company now has more than 1.5 million subscribers. With more than 4,000 satellites operating in orbit, the Elon Musk-owned company’s global coverage is active in over 50 countries around the world.

> By his estimate, “something on the order of 50% to 70%” of Starlink’s base is from “growing the pie portion, as opposed to taking” from incumbents, with Hughes and Viasat in total losing “less than 500,000 subscribers.” But those numbers change based on region and customer vertical. Prokosh pointed to the U.S., Brazil and Australia as three mini-case studies.

> Brazil, he noted, is the most dramatic example of Starlink taking share from incumbent satellite providers, where Starlink has added nearly the same amount of customers that Hughes has lost. It’s also lowered prices locally to about $35 a month (versus the $120 a month base in the States).

> But Australia’s a different story: Prokosh said, according to the country’s reporting in March, Starlink is up to 120,000 subscribers, while the incumbent satellite service provider NBN has seen only slight customer decay from its peak of about 106,000 customers.

>“This is clear evidence of the pie absolutely growing because of Starlink, as opposed to just drawing from established business of other operators,” Prokosh said of Australia.

> “In maritime … it’s almost all net growth for the industry right now, because what’s happening for the most part is that the vessels adopting the service aren’t dropping their incumbent service yet – they’re trialing Starlink,” Prokosh said.