SpaceX is close to reaching four million customers with its Starlink satellite internet constellation, revealed the firm's president and chief operations officer Gwynne Shotwell shared during a hearing at the Texas House of Representatives earlier this week. Shotwell was speaking before the Texas Appropriations Committee for the Texas Space Commission, and she added that her firm has invested $3 billion into developing its facilities in the state for Starship.
Starship is the world's largest rocket in development, and it is fundamental to SpaceX's aim of sending humans to Mars. Shotwell also shared that her firm plans to launch 100 Falcon 9 rockets as part of its plans to build the Starlink satellite internet constellation, with the increased cadence coming at a time when SpaceX is also rapidly building a portion of the Starlink constellation capable of providing direct to cell coverage for smartphones.
SpaceX President Shares Starship & Starlink Details At Texas Congress Hearing
Shotwell started her prepared remarks for the committee by sharing details about SpaceX's Starlink terminal facilities in Texas. She outlined that the firm has a million square feet factory in Texas, and it will continue to expand the facilities as Starlink's customer base grows. So far this year, SpaceX has signed multiple airlines to its Starlink network and added more countries to its coverage. As a result, this week, SpaceX "will pass four million customers for Starlink, which is quite exciting," shared Shotwell. After her remarks, made on Tuesday, SpaceX confirmed earlier today that Starlink had crossed the four million user mark.
To rapidly build out the Starlink satellite internet constellation, the SpaceX president stated that her company hopes "to launch roughly a hundred missions, to put more Starlink satellites in orbit" to allow people living in rural Texas and in other rural communities worldwide to connect to the Internet.
Starlink is also key to SpaceX's efforts to take humans to Mars. By growing a satellite internet network, the firm hopes to fund its Starship rocket, which is being developed in Boca Chica, Texas. Starship's full stack, with the second stage placed on top of the first stage, has flown four times so far, and the next flight is slated to take place in late November.
Commenting on Starship, the SpaceX executive shared that SpaceX's Starship facilities, called Starbase, "is a one of a kind facility to manufacture, test, and launch the most advanced rockets on the planet there." Starship "is capable of launching over a hundred fifty metric tons to Earth orbit," Shotwell added, outlining that as part of SpaceX's Starbase development, it has "invested more than three billion dollars, uh, over the last few years, with just a billion in outlays in Texas uh this past year."
As for its Starlink user dish production in Bastrop, Shotwell outlined that SpaceX plans to compete with Taiwan and other Asian countries for the dish's printed circuit boards. "Bastrop will be the largest printed circuit board manufacturing facility in the entire United States. And I'm pretty sure we'll be able to beat Southeast Asia in efficiency of producing those printed circuit boards," she outlined.
SpaceX has currently stacked the Starship rockets for its fifth flight in Boca Chica. The previous Starship test was in June, and since then, the firm has revamped the upper stage rocket's heat shield and repeatedly tested the tower catch arms to recover the booster post flight. These arms will attempt to catch the Starship Super Heavy booster as it returns from the test, and if Starship Flight 5 and future tests are successful, then the second stage Starship might also return to the launch site.
About the author: Ramish is a seasoned technology writer and editor with more than a decade of experience. He specializes in semiconductor fabrication and market analysis. With a background in finance and supply chain management - via his bachelors in Finance and a micromasters in supply chain management from MIT - Ramish combines financial rigor with deep industry insight to deliver accurate and authoritative coverage.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
