“We hope to have applied for a commercial license on or
before January 31, 2022 (unless we hit some major roadblock),” Starlink’s India
head Sanjay Bhargava said in a LinkedIn post Friday evening.
This is Starlink’s first official communication exactly a
week after the Indian government barred SpaceX’s satellite broadband arm from
seeking pre-bookings for its internet from space services since it doesn’t have
a licence.
Bhargava wrote “there are currently unknowns on when you may
get your Starlink” but urged potential customers in India to “pay careful
consideration to whether Starlink could just be the broadband solution” they
need.
He added that the company’s goal is "to provide context
on how Starlink could be a great fit for connectivity" in numerous
situations. “A 100% Broadband India will require collaboration across
stakeholders, service providers, and technologies, and we encourage everyone to
think about their use cases and develop connectivity plans for districts as well
as private use.” Bhargava said in his latest LinkedIn post.
A week ago, the communications ministry had issued a terse
directive, saying Musk’s broadband from-space venture was not a licensee in
India, and had even issued a public advisory asking Indian citizens not to
subscribe to Starlink’s upcoming satellite internet service.
Prior to the government order, Musk’s SpaceX had been
accepting pre-orders for the beta version of the service for a fully refundable
deposit of $99
Earlier, Starlink’s Bhargava had said that pre-orders from
India had already crossed 5,000. He had even encouraged potential customers to
get added to the company’s priority list by depositing $99 to avoid being
waitlisted. The company had been targeting satellite broadband coverage in
India in 2022.
But following the missive from the communications ministry,
SpaceX has recently withdrawn its offer for pre-booking its satellite internet
service in India.
According to media reports, Starlink has applied for a
permit to start a pilot services with a limited set of users. But for a
commercial launch, it is likely to require a GMPCS (global mobile personal
communication by satellite) licence.
Musk’s SpaceX bid for an initial India foray into the
broadband from-space turf faced its first challenge in March when an industry
body representing rival Bharti-backed OneWeb, Amazon, Hughes, Google, Microsoft
and Facebook among others wrote to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India
(Trai) and the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) asking them to stop
SpaceX from pre-selling the beta version of its service in India.
The broadband association claimed that SpaceX did not have a
valid licence or authorisation from the Indian government to offer such
services in the country.
The government directive comes at a time when the likes of
Bharti-backed OneWeb, Musk’s SpaceX, Jeff Bezos-founded Amazon and the
Tata-Telesat combine are readying to enter India’s nascent broadband-from-space
segment, leveraging on their respective global low–earth orbit (LEO) satellite
constellations.
Both SpaceX and OneWeb plan to launch broadband from space
services next year. Industry experts see India as a major emerging satellite
internet market with a $1 billion-plus near-term annual revenue opportunity.