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Intuitively, what's the cost to get to orbit? SpaceX's Falcon reusable rocket lowered the cost to get to space by an order of magnitude or so, so you have to fa
by fragmede 4mo ago
Intuitively, what's the cost to get to orbit? SpaceX's Falcon reusable rocket lowered the cost to get to space by an order of magnitude or so, so you have to factor that in.
- fluoridation 4mo agoI only counted the cost of the satellite itself. I assumed you can get it into orbit for free, so if it costs a cent more than that, it's a further argument against.
- elcritch 4mo agoStarlink is manufacturing the satellites at scale. They’re likely to cost not much differently from large ground based 5G towers at some point. The antennas are “digital” so no expensive mechanical systems needed.
- fluoridation 4mo agoEven if I grant that, radio towers don't deorbit after a few years. I have no idea what you mean by antennas being digital.
- inemesitaffia 4mo agoOlder sats (and OneWeb) use parabolic dishes. Some fixed, some steerable. Apart from being SDR's, Starlink and its newer competition use phased array antennas. So they can provide extra capacity to denser areas.
- inemesitaffia 4mo agoFrom the S1 satellites are $600k and launch is under $20 million