SpaceX’s Starship Setback Could Hold Up Cellphone Ambitions

When SpaceX’s new Starship rocket exploded during a test flight in April, the company largely painted it as a success to have even gotten the 400-foot-tall behemoth off the ground. But inside the company, some employees were worried that the setback could delay, among other things, a SpaceX plan to provide wireless coverage to cellphones that are out of range of typical networks, according to people close to the company.

That effort, known as direct to cell, relies on satellites from Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet service, to provide basic cellphone communications that customers can use in a pinch from remote locations. A little over a year ago, SpaceX announced plans to roll out such a service in partnership with T-Mobile as early as late 2023. But SpaceX is still working out technical kinks and currently doesn’t even plan to begin testing the ability to send direct-to-cell messages with T-Mobile phones until next year, according to two people familiar with the project.

It faces another challenge: Its direct-to-cell ambitions depend on larger satellites that need Starship to get into space, say people close to the project. As a stopgap, SpaceX has come up with a design for a smaller satellite that can hitch a ride on the company’s current rockets, but those satellites are likely to limit cellphone users on the ground to texting rather than other more data-intensive forms of communication, the people said.