SpaceX’s application to acquire Grain Management’s spectrum assets has been accepted

Abstract:

On November 11, according to an announcement issued by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on November 10, local time,

SpaceX’s application to acquire Grain Management’s 800MHz spectrum assets has been accepted

This transaction involves 546 paired spectrum licenses, covering an area covering approximately 100% of the US population

According to the transaction arrangement, SpaceX will obtain control of the two license holders Prism License Co. 1 and Prism License Co. 2 through its wholly-owned subsidiary Starlink Spectrum Holdings. The relevant licenses involve up to 14MHz of paired 800MHz spectrum, distributed in 50 states, Washington, DC, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, covering 3,224 counties.

Grain Management announced on October 8 that it had signed a final agreement with SpaceX to sell its U.S. 800MHz spectrum portfolio to the latter. The two parties did not disclose the transaction price. 800MHz is a low-frequency spectrum with the characteristics of long propagation distance, strong diffraction ability and strong indoor penetration ability. It is usually used to build the wide-area coverage layer of mobile communication networks.

SpaceX plans to use this part of the spectrum for Starlink Mobile business and combine the satellite direct connection mobile phone system with ground communication facilities to form a hybrid network. The company also applied to the FCC on October 27, hoping to use relevant frequency bands to provide satellite supplementary coverage services. The application is still in the review stage.

The FCC announcement shows that relevant opinions and objection applications should be submitted before December 1 and December 8 respectively. If the transaction is ultimately approved, SpaceX will also need to comply with the FCC's previous ground network construction and satellite direct communication deployment requirements for this batch of spectrum.