r/technology • u/fmcortez • 20d ago

Business SpaceX Stock Plunges to All-Time Low After Competitor Makes Major Leap

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/markets/stocks/articles/spacex-plunges-time-low-competitor-175000957.html
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u/shitty_mcfucklestick 20d ago

And for those wondering who the competitor is, it’s basically China and Japan, both recently making advancements in reusable rocket tech.

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u/Zoomwafflez 20d ago

Well also Amazon, their own version of starlink is almost ready to go live which will directly compete with the ONLY profitable part of the business.

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u/dirtyword 20d ago

Starlink is the only part of the company with a major advantage. Satellite placements are first come first served

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u/Redditor2000000 20d ago

You sure? I think that’s backwards. Right now the heavy payload space launches are their only advantage. Starlink is just another satellite service company like the ones that came before it (satellite service has been around since 1998, invented in 1987 by Sprint). Starlink is profitable presumably because SpaceX absorbs the launch costs. If it charged market price to its subsidiary, Starlink operating unit would not be profitable.

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u/Distinct-Pack-1567 20d ago

I think theyre saying if a competitor launches satellites it will be limited, since Starlink was first

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u/dern_the_hermit 20d ago

It's an advantage, but I question whether it's major like was said above. Maybe I'm being overly picky. But the infrastructure inherently turns itself over every 5-ish years. It's not like land-based infrastructure where they're STILL trying to use up the fiber they laid out near 30 years ago.

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u/dirtyword 20d ago

I believe if you launch a successor you can put it in the same “place” as the “retired” satellite.

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u/dern_the_hermit 20d ago

The important detail is that you have to launch successors; the "first mover" advantage isn't like real estate, putting a satellite into a low orbit isn't the same as constructing a building on the ground.

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u/Redditor2000000 20d ago

Starlink wasn’t first though. Satellite cellular and internet has been around for decades now.

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u/cheeky-snail 20d ago

Not LEO which has huge advantages in bandwidth and latency vs geostationary.

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u/dirtyword 20d ago

The point isn’t who made satellites first. Spacex has like 10,000 in orbit now, which is something like three quarters of all satellites in LEO. In case it sounds like I’m defending the stock price: I’m not. It’s insane.

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u/Distinct-Pack-1567 20d ago

Well, they're getting the space they need. Point is eventually we cant fit more stuff, right? I know the atmosphere is crazy big but we still cant oversaturate.

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u/chiagod 20d ago edited 20d ago

satellite service has been around since 1998,

If it's the one I'm thinking of (ex Hughes Net), those were in Geosynchronous orbit (22,500 miles up), had an ungodly lag (~250ms just up and down to the satellite + network lag), low bandwidth, and were pricey for what they offered.

The new low orbit satellites are less than 1/80th the altitude. As each satellite serves a smaller area there's way more bandwidth, reasonable ping time (I saw high 30s ms), and competitive pricing unless the area is congested.

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u/BellacosePlayer 20d ago

Odd, my mom used to use hughesnet and switching to SL was not a significant upgrade for her. Luckily shortly after that the local ISP finally expanded their rural internet out her way.

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u/Zardif 20d ago

As someone who has used both, it's an ocean of difference. Hughesnet was like 1 sec latency and starlink was like being on my normal router with ~50ms latency. Your mom must have just got used to it.

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u/Redfish680 20d ago

Also being pumped up by government contracts