Shulou(Shulou.com)12/24 Report--

CTOnews.com, December 13, yesterday, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decided to reject SpaceX's application for subsidy for Starlink satellite Internet services on the grounds that the test flight of the starship (Starship) had not been successful, which led to their lack of confidence in SpaceX.

FCC also quoted data shared by SpaceX as saying that the company had failed to fully meet the subsidy's performance targets.

This subsidy is a long-term subsidy of the Rural Digital opportunity Fund (RDOF) program, and in fact SpaceX has received subsidies before. To receive RDOF subsidies, SpaceX must submit two applications-an initial short-term application and a final long-term application.

SPaceX received a $855 million subsidy from a short-term application to provide satellite Internet services to 642925 locations in 35 states in the United States. (CTOnews.com Note: about 6.139 billion yuan)

After SpaceX won the bid, it entrusted the submission of its long-term application to its subsidiary Starlink. FCC rejected the application after several competitors questioned that SpaceX would use Starship rockets to build the second phase of the constellation, and then SpaceX asked FCC to rescind the decision and review it, but FCC yesterday announced that it would uphold the decision.

FCC stated that it did not agree with SpaceX's argument that since it had been approved in the first phase the Committee had ruled out the possibility that it would be able to meet the RDOF requirements.

FCC believes that there are two main reasons why Starlink cannot meet the requirements of RDOF: the first point is the performance of the service, the second point is the Starship rocket, and a key point of debate between the two sides is also the performance data of Starlink.

FCC presented data provided by Ookla (describing Starlink's performance in 2021 and 2022), arguing that these data did not reflect the excellent performance of Starlink when the RDOF program began to be covered in 2025.

In its appeal, SpaceX claimed that Ookla data did not represent Starlink's performance in 2025, while FCC argued that due to the lack of a comparable system, Ookla data was the only data that could be relied on.

The second reason for FCC's decision to uphold the original award was SpaceX's Starship project. According to FCC, the agency relied on information about Starship in its assessment, which led to a lack of confidence in Starship's ability to launch second-generation Starlink satellites.

In fact, SpaceX initially made two possible launch plans for Starlink, either using Falcon 9 or Starship, but the decision drew criticism from competitors, and the company later decided to rely entirely on Starship for the launch.

SpaceX expressed disappointment with FCC's decision, emphasizing that Starlink is the "most likely" best choice to provide RDOF coverage. Although they thought the move was too "arbitrary", the company finally expressed its willingness to work with the committee in the hope of providing services to areas that were not covered.

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