Welcome to episode 243 of the 6G podcast. It's
the latest insights on everything 6G. We covered
six topics in about 30 minutes and it's brought
to you by Morris Size of Strategy. I'm Anshul
Tha and joining me again this week is fellow
analyst Mike Dano from Ookla. And once again,
we've had a busy week, lots going on, and I guess
I'll kick off with my first topic because I was
on the road with HP. They had their Imagine 2026
conference, which was pretty focused around their
AI product. That's going to live across most
of its commercial PCs. But the important part
was actually that they had a pretty big update
to their HP Go service and also broadened the
number of devices that support it. Last year,
they launched HP Go, which is their own cellular
service. that combines T -Mobile, Verizon, and
AT &T. You basically just get the best service
that's available to you in the area. You can
also, at a certain tier, roam globally. You don't
even have to worry about it when you leave the
country. It was only available on one device,
which was like the HP EliteBook 8 G1Q, which
was a Qualcomm -based device. Might even be the
EliteBook 6, but it wasn't really. A very high
-end notebook, but it wasn't really a very low
-end notebook. And it was one notebook. Applicability
was not great. Now it's actually going to span
the entire spectrum of HP's lineup. From 2, 4,
6, 8 and up, there will be SKUs across all those
different tiers of notebooks that will offer
HP Go. And in addition to that, HP Go will now
be available within the European Union for HP
customers to activate as a service. So while
it... worked in the European Union didn't work
for European customers. So now 23 countries in
Europe will be able to sign up for it in addition
to the US, which will significantly broaden their
customer base, especially when you consider the
fact that Europeans actually use mobile broadband
more than Americans do on their PCs. And a big
reason for that is because a lot of Europeans
use trains to commute to work and other public
transit so they can actually be mobile. and productive
while they're getting to work and such and so
forth. Yeah, I think this is a great move for
them. In addition to that, they also updated
their Wolf Connect with a new modem. This is
a manageability layer. It's specifically for
protecting and tracing your system so you can
remote wipe without needing to actually pay for
an actual cellular connection. It's like a narrowband
kind of connection that operates in the background
below the OS layer. It also does piggyback on
5G if you do have that, but they updated it so
it's a more efficient modem. So it uses less
power and it's even less of a challenge for the
IT department to deploy. And yeah, really interesting
to see them. I think they're the leader in terms
of deploying cellular on PCs right now amongst
the big PC OEMs. And I think in my research,
I think the number one thing that people who
deploy 5G PCs. experience is bad coverage. It's
actually the number one pain point that they
have is that coverage. So if you can squash that
with all three carriers, I think it's a big deal.
And we'll see, I think this will be the year
where we actually get an idea of what this service
can do because it's not just on a trial on a
single device in one country. And of course they're
going to have to sell it to you. But yeah, that
was my thoughts. I'd love to hear what you think
about it. I'm actually very surprised to hear
that. This is the first time I've ever hearing
about HP Go. I didn't even know that was a program.
I know for a long time, we've been talking about
cellular enabled laptops and when that market
is going to start developing. And I think there
was a, when the early or in the 4G era, there
was push to get 4G embedded into laptops. And
there was some 4G capable laptops out there.
It didn't really take off. The extra cost is
obviously a challenge. And I think the same thing
in 5G, I know that there's more laptops out there
that do have built -in 5G. than in the 4G era,
but certainly it hasn't really caught on to any
great degree. And obviously the cost there too
is still an issue. It's like $100 more, same
for tablets. So I'm actually interested to hear
that HP is really working to address this issue.
I think from my standpoint, I'm definitely watching
Apple to see when we'll get a MacBook or something
that has built -in 5G. And now that Apple is
investing so heavily into the Silicon. Presumably
that would put them in a position to put 5G directly
into the MacBooks. But I do still wonder about,
is that a good idea? Because I still tether.
Every time I go out, tether my laptop to my phone
works great. And so even now, I've had people
explain to me the reasons behind having a 5G
capable laptop. I get it. But man, it's still
pretty easy to set up that tether and then keep
your laptop a little cheaper. Yeah, I'm interested
to hear that HP is moving along that path. I'm
curious to see how that works out and then if
it spreads to other major laptop manufacturers.
I would agree. I have resorted to tethering when
I don't have a 5G connection. But I will tell
you, the current class of 5G PCs are faster than
tethering, especially when you consider the latency
and power consumption that you have to deal with
on your phone. The antennas on those PCs are
much nicer than they are on your phone. Especially
once we get better, better modems. And I think
your point, Apple could probably ship a 5G PC
today if they wanted. They have the pieces, they
have the modems, they have everything in place.
I think it's just really a question of when and
why. And the new Mac Neo could be how they do
it, right? Really low cost device. Find a really
low cost modem and use the carrier to help subsidize
it. And then it's okay. I have a PC as a service
and it's basically free as long as you pay for
the condition. So there's a lot of interesting
things I think we can do with that. But I think
HP is definitely at the forefront here. And speaking
of connections. Yes. You've got your first topic.
I do. And actually here's, here was my, my pivot
to that was that I was going to say, speaking
of hotspots, that is how I stayed connected during
the cable next gen event. I used my phone as
my hotspot during this event because the hotel
wifi was quite slow. And I was really glad that
my cellular connection was so strong inside of
the building. So yeah, this week I spent a day
at the Cable NextGen event. It was here in Denver.
I've been to it several times over the past couple
of years. It's actually a really good event for
the cable industry. It's usually, it's not huge,
a couple hundred people. This year it was noticeably
smaller than past years. And it's all about basically
cable networking technology. A lot about DOCSIS.
DAA, nodes, all that kind of stuff. So yeah,
you really get down into the details of the networking
technology real quick. I thought one interesting
takeaway from the show was they had two executives
from Comcast speak and they both were very interesting.
And the second speaker really went into actually
what you talked about last week, which was the
NVIDIA announcement that Comcast had mainly about
essentially edge computing. And so they talked
about that. And what I thought was really interesting
was that they talked about some of the demos
that they have been running using that edge computing
technology. One was like it was it was basically
like a real time video call. And you could use
this edge computing technology to put different
clothes onto your body. And so as you're speaking
and moving, the clothes would move around in
real time and it would look like you have on
a hockey jersey, for example. Another one of
their I thought interesting demos was that they
were. showing off real -time translation services.
And as you're speaking, you could have that video
in real time translated into another language,
but also the video itself would be changed so
that your lips would be making the movements
of speaking in a different language. So it wouldn't
look like it was dubbed and your lips were making
other movements. It was that your lips actually
looked like you were saying the words in another
language. And that was all done through the edge
computing. technology that Comcast has been talking
about with NVIDIA. So that was interesting. But
I think broadly, my takeaway from that show was
that there are a lot of threats that the cable
companies specifically are facing. Obviously,
fixed wireless is a real big one that I think
is well known that it is really digging into
the cable industry's core broadband business.
And there was a speaker from IQ Fiber who talked
about The expansion that IQ Fiber is doing, so
they're a middle market player. They're active
in a couple of states, about 100 ,000 homes in
their footprint. And they're really challenging
the cable companies that are in their footprint.
They sell, and so they're a fiber operator and
they sell symmetrical service plans up to five
gigabytes, sorry, five gigabytes up and down.
And they say 10 % of their customers are choosing
those. kinds of plans. Between the threat from
fiber companies like that, fixed wireless companies,
and they also talked about satellite companies
like Starlink, all these different kinds of providers
are really starting to squeeze into cable companies.
And I think the attendance at that show reflects
the challenges that cable operators face. It's
really a show that is, it's not expanding. It
does seem to be shrinking, but interesting show,
like a lot of interesting stuff coming out of
there. And the edge computing thing. But it does
tie into what a lot of companies are talking
about now, particularly with NVIDIA GPUs. But
I think, yeah. I was going to add that I'm not
surprised that it's dwindling. I do think the
cable operators did have an opportunity to modernize
their infrastructure. Some of them did. The fiber.
I think the future has always been fiber. Obviously,
there's plenty of opportunities where SW makes
more sense. But I think the way I look at it
is. Copper is the legacy technology and all the
others are its replacement in different scenarios,
which is why I was hoping that bead and all these
other services that we were trying to roll out
with government funding, we're going to take
advantage of all opportunities and not just try
to focus on one. I think it was a little bit
misguided trying to put fiber everywhere, like
millimeter waves doesn't fit everywhere. And
I think satellite does have a lot of great way
to fill gaps. but it's not really a capacity
technology. I'm hoping to see more mixtures of
these things. And maybe more operators investing
in upgrades. Because the truth is I've had symmetrical
fiber for a very long time. And you will have
to pry it from my hands, my cold dead hands.
I have a five gig symmetrical connection option.
But I only use one gig because the price is a
little bit absurd. It's 250 a month for five.
And I don't really need that. Going to try it
out, just see what it's like. But yeah, it's
just, it shouldn't be that expensive. I assume
the operator you're talking about does not charge
250. I think otherwise. No. 130 is what he said.
Half. And that feels reasonable, I think. Yeah.
Agree. So do you think that we're in a place
where cable continues to struggle? And to your
point, some of them have also moved towards offering
cellular services and repackaging those and bundling.
I want to see it. I think it's the monopolies.
Yeah. Yeah. One of the interesting things that
came out of last week, too, was an analyst note
from the financial analysts at TD Cohen, who
had a fiber event this past week also. And in
their report from that event, they said that
Shentel, which is one of the regional cable fiber
providers, they are actually Shentel is experimenting
with overbuilding their own cable network with
a fiber network. And so they're just exploring
that. They're just testing it in one market right
now. But the fact that a smaller cable operator
is considering that possibility of just overbuilding
their own cable network with fiber, I think is
really a, it's a signal of things to come. I
think you're right. Eventually all roads lead
to fiber as far as I can tell. Totally. Yeah.
I'll let this transition to my second topic.
Not that this is a smooth transition, but how
about I pitch it over to you? Is that good? Well,
there we go. So yesterday was opening day and
it was the first day, first full day because
opening night was the night before. I don't know
why they did it to Netflix. That was a whole
disaster. Netflix does not do baseball well,
especially not live baseball. It was a nightmare.
But opening day, I was there in person in San
Diego. The Padres played the Detroit Tigers and
lost. However. It was the commercial deployment
of automated balls of strikes, which was tested
last year at spring training. And then again,
this year at spring training, but fully rolled
out in all stadiums. This is a service. If you're
not familiar with it, it is a combination of
Sony's technology with T -Mobile 5G as the compute
or the connection for all the 12 different cameras.
And it basically decides whether or not it's
a ball or a strike before the umpire does. But
it does not get called upon unless there is a
challenge from the player, the pitcher, or the
catcher. And one of those three people has two
seconds to challenge the call by the umpire.
And then they tap their head to challenge. And
then the umpire says there's a challenge. The
call is a strike. And then they go look at the,
they actually give it. like a visual representation
that everybody can see in the stadium. And it
shows you how many inches it's in or out and
whether or not the call stands. And then the
game moves on. So it takes, I've watched it during
spring training. This is my first time seeing
it in person. I almost missed it. It happened
so fast, which is great because it should be
that fast. And it seems to be very reliable.
Both teams get two challenges per game. They
keep their challenge if their challenge is overturned
and they're able to overturn the call. But if
they're wrong and the umpire is correct, they
lose that challenge. They only get two per game,
two misses per game. And then they can't challenge
any more strikes. So you got to be pretty good
at it. Ironically, someone released some data
yesterday for all of the previous challenges
that occurred under the preseason spring training
games. And the New York Yankees are the most
prolific challengers and the worst at getting
their calls of the tournament, which is really
funny. But other than that, it's really cool
because it's a real 5G technology accelerating
and improving baseball and making it more fun.
And last year, baseball grew hugely. I think
something like this will further improve the
game because people do not enjoy when umpires
make bad calls. I don't think it improves the
game. And I think this also might hold them a
little bit more accountable because there really
was no form of accountability for these umpires
in the past. It'll be really interesting to see
how... it affects their accuracy because I'm
a big data nerd and baseball is a data nerd's
sport. And there's actually multiple accounts
out there that rate every single umpire's accuracy
every game the next day and give a full detailed
map mappings of heat maps of their accuracy and
which pitches were most impactful and how they
affected the game. So ABS will really help, I
think, make the game more fair. I think this
also advantages pitchers because There's a lot
of pitchers who throw incredible pitches that
don't get them called and they know that they
should be getting calls. I think this, we will
see probably a lower scoring season this season
because pitchers will get a little bit more of
an advantage with ABS. It is a pretty smart move
by T -Mobile, right? To sponsor this and have
it powered by 5G. It really is a, in terms of
smart branding, it's hard to beat that. It displays
the brand, it displays the technology. It's America's
favorite pastime. It really does make sense.
What I think I wonder, though, is so I'm not
a fan of sports, ball sports in general. I just
I wish I was. I just I can't quite bring myself
to care about it, unfortunately. But I do wonder
about technological upgrades to sports that trace
their history back 150 years. And does it lose
something if there's if you can measure it down
to the millimeter? Are you losing something?
is an essential part of the game that is now
lost because technology has encroached into the
rules of the game. I don't know the answer to
that. It sounds like obviously you're a fan of
this new development, but I wonder if there's
a little bit of a nostalgia toward calling it
like you see it, and if the Empire calls it,
you just have to deal with it even if he's wrong.
No? Not so much? I think there's absolutely a
group of people who feel that way. But the truth
is that they are a dying breed. And the truth
is the way I look at ABS in general is just if
it's a strike, it's a strike. If it's not. And
sure, you can include, incorporate the elements
of human error into it. But the problem is that
there are some umpires out there that are atrocious.
There are entire accounts that exist to show
the worst called plays by umpires. And some of
them are off by eight inches. The plates aren't
even that wide. I think the purists will absolutely
say you're right. Something is lost from the
game as a result of this. But the people who
love the game that want it just to be fair and
give everybody a fair chance, I think it's a
good thing for the game. I don't think it'll
slow the game down. And I think overall, there's
just more opportunities for them to pay attention
to other things that happen in the game because
there's so many other things that they can call.
And the truth is a lot of umpires, their eyesight's
not to praise. So I was going to say they're
blind, but the truth is as you get older, your
eyes are not as good. And to get to the level
of being an MLB umpire, it takes a long time.
So we get very many young umpires, which means
that their eyes are just not that good. So I
think having this system will be something that
they can rely upon to correct errors. There have
been very many funny calls that have happened
where umpires, oh, I guess I was right. And all
these kinds of things where it's like very entertaining.
I think it's net positive. And to your point,
I read some articles about this partnership actually
goes back three years for T -Mobile. So they
really invested in it back then. I think it's
going to pay dividends because if you think about
it, both teams get a minimum of two calls over
to challenge, right? So that's a minimum of four
times a game. You're probably going to see it
happen. And that's, and not just that, but T
-Mobile was being associated with something that's
the truth. So T -Mobile was enabling the truth.
But no, I think it's great marketing. I think
it's going to pay dividends for them, regardless
of what they paid, because it's like basically
free marketing. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, interesting.
Yeah. Yeah, I like the idea of technological
accountability. I think that's a fun one. Here,
try this pivot on for size. Talking about technological
accountability, my next topic is about the new
FCC ban against foreign Wi -Fi routers. So this
week, the FCC put out a sort of a surprise announcement.
And the announcement essentially says, from now
into the future. They are going to work to prevent
Wi -Fi router, consumer Wi -Fi routers that are
manufactured by foreign companies and manufactured
in foreign locations. So that all of them, which
is literally every single Wi -Fi router in the
world, all of them are either manufactured somewhere
else or made by a company that is not based in
the US. And so essentially what it means is that.
If you are making a Wi -Fi router now, you need
to apply for a waiver at the FCC. So presumably,
so as not to just immediately destroy the entire
Wi -Fi router industry with one fell swoop, presumably
the FCC will be issuing waivers to this new rule.
And from the perspective of the FCC, their goal
is to prevent hacks like the Salt Typhoon hack,
which was well reported. hack that happened i
think it was a year or two ago in that it allowed
a foreign adversary essentially unfettered access
into u .s telecom networks the extent was never
fully reported but it did seem like one of the
worst cyber hacks that the u .s telecommunications
industry has ever experienced and i assume this
new ruling is stems out of that incident and
others like it but yeah the reaction to this
surprise ruling from the fcc was pretty loud
it was I think the Wi -Fi Now Alliance put out
a blog post about all the questions that this
raises. The FCC and the White House may have
inadvertently opened Pandora's box, was one of
their takeaways. And then your friend in mind,
Avi Grigard, he wrote a post as well, talking
about all the different issues that this raises
and essentially arguing that to move any, to
move... The manufacture of Wi -Fi routers into
the U .S. is going to take several years at least.
And even then, the companies that may want to
do that have no guarantee that when they accomplish
that, if they are able to move manufacturing
into the U .S., whether they'll be rewarded politically
or not. The political winds may blow a different
way and the rules could change and then their
investments into U .S.-based manufacturing might
not actually pan out. Which is exactly what happened
to Nokia. Nokia invested heavily into U .S. manufacturing
in order to take advantage of the BEAD program.
The BEAD program hat was really designed to reward
U .S.-based manufacturing. And then it's been
stalled over the past couple of years. And so
the investment that Nokia made, I think eventually
will pay out, but certainly did not pay out in
the way that Nokia had initially hoped. Yeah,
it's just, it's another example of some sort
of heavy -handed government rulings coming down.
onto the industry and really surprising everyone.
And so I think, oh, and one thing we did do here
within Ookla, we looked up some of the top brands
that we are seeing within the data for, we can
actually see Wi -Fi router vendors. And some
of the big ones that we see here in the U .S.
are Eero, Wistron, Sagemcom, Technicolor, Netgear,
Ares, Nokia, ASCII, and Arcadian, I think is
how you say that one. But those are some of the
big names that come up when we do our search
for CPE vendors. But yeah, I think all of those
companies are going to be scrambling in order
to figure out what this exactly means for their
business. The Arcadian one is the white label
OEM for T -Mobile's routers. And all of the 5G
routers that they make, those are all Arcadians.
Yeah. I was flabbergasted. A little surprised
about that, huh? I guess. It's just such an...
It's level of stupidity. But you know what? It
also feels like something they're becoming the
gatekeepers once again. I'm not going to hold
back here. This is the most corrupt administration
we've ever had. Here we go. Buckle up. This is
an opportunity for them to once again gatekeep
and expect donations and money and whatever praise
they want to get to get approval. Because to
your point, absolutely. I mean, I'm a router
manufacturer. How much money do I need to invest
in manufacturing in the U .S. over the next few
years? Because if it's been one year or two years,
maybe two years best case scenario, right? And
then the administration changes and the parties
change and the rules no longer apply. And all
this money is lost, like you said, for Nokia.
It's like there's really no winning for these
guys here. And the cheapest route is really just
payola. I think the real thing is I'm 100%. holding
router manufacturers accountable for the lack
of security of their routers. Like, I do a lot
of Wi -Fi router testing and reviews. And the
truth is, almost every single router manufacturer
has terrible security. ASUS got dinged so hard
for how insecure their routers were. And the
truth is, like, there's no accountability. There
should be fines. There should be bans. But blanket
banning everybody that's not manufacturing US,
that just feels like more... political payola.
And the truth is I'd love to see more accountability
on security and having them submit to audits.
I think that would be great because I just think
router manufacturers are not really incentivized
or regulatorily required to have secure firmware.
And the truth is I review lots of routers and
they have memory leaks. They fundamentally have
memory leaks. Bad. So. If they can't even do
router firmware without memory leaks, what makes
you think they're going to do a good job with
security unless somebody holds it? So that's
been my experience. I'm not going to name names,
but half the names you mentioned, I have dealt
with their memory leaks on their routers. Yeah,
I just think some companies are going to try
and lead to this and take advantage of it. Others
are not. I think the name brands are probably
going to be more focused on this because they
want to continue to ship in the US. Interestingly,
I didn't hear you mention Belkin. They own Lexus.
So I would have expected them to be somewhere
on this list. I was surprised to hear you mention
Technicolor because it's a conglomerate now,
but I guess they must have some kind of router
business. But yeah, it's just, it's frustrating.
I think it's stupid. And I think it's par for
the course for how the way this administration
operates. Not to mention, I won't say any of
my opinions about Burning Cloud. That's a whole
other story. I think we could go on and on about
different opinions on how this administration
and Brendan Carr is moving forward. And I think
I very much agree with a lot of this. I think...
If the problem is security, then deal with the
problem of security. I don't think the problem
is about U .S.-based manufacturing. I think those
are two different problems. You might get close
to one with the other, but if the problem is
security, then address it from a security standpoint,
not from a where -does -this -come -from standpoint.
You can still have unsecured devices in the U
.S. If the problem is security, deal with security.
And I think, too, I think broadly it's that...
All of the companies in our industry, and I think
us included, we do not want the government putting
their finger on the scale. And that's a little
bit what this feels like. I understand government
regulations, government mandates, and the role
of government. But I think overreaching and favoring
some groups over others, I think it just becomes
a real slippery slope. Yeah, we just don't want
the government to put their finger on the scale.
We want a fair industry. It's worryingly... This
does seem somewhat unfair and slightly unprepared
and a little bit of a surprise. Maybe it could
have been rolled out a little bit more effective.
Chaos is the point. Chaos is a ladder, according
to Game of Thrones. So, here we go. Anyway, aside
from that, I think you've got one more good topic,
too. Yeah, so this one's a fun one. In my research
for topics, I did have a different topic earlier
before I realized I wanted to talk baseball,
which was that Ubiquiti has their own router,
ironically enough, that they launched. It's a
5G router that supports all three carriers. So
it's a 5G router with all of the Ubiquiti routing
capabilities built into it. So it's a pretty
cool, I feel like it's 400 bucks. It's going
to be available now. It's cool. It's cool. I
can get one. That said, I will also talk about
Turkey. So Turkey. I didn't know this, does not
have 5G. I thought they did. I would have expected
them to have 5G. It is the year of our Lord in
2026. And they don't have it. So they had a Spectrum
launch back in October of last year. And now
we have an actual launch coming April 1st. And
I saw this article. It took me off to this. And
I was like, it was actually about Shack. Partnering
with Erdogan, who's the Prime Minister of...
Turkey, President Tayyip Erdogan, and they're
launching 5G April 1st. And it will be in the
entire country, all 81 provinces, which is a
big deal. And I was just like really shocked
because Turkey is a country of 86 million people
that do not have 5G, which is like a mind blow
to me because technically we've had in the US
since 2020. But I was thinking like, oh, we're
talking about 6G, but. Some countries don't even
have 5G. I think this is worth talking about.
Also, I thought it was fascinating that Shaq
is part of this 5G launch, specifically with
Turkcell, which is like the biggest carrier in
the country. So Shaq is helping launch 5G. That's
just 2026. What won't happen in 2026? Shaq will
launch 5G. And they're saying that the rollout
will be enabled by Ericsson Institute. It's a
mixed carrier and mix. I mean, deployment, but
I'm just like really shocked. Can't believe that
one, they don't have 5g and two that I didn't
know that, but 86 million customers is a lot,
big opportunity. And yeah, I think it's going
to be interesting to see if it's going to be
a standalone deployment since it's 2026, because
they can just be standalone or off the bat. Cause
then they might actually have an advantage on
some carriers. So I don't know. I would love
to find out, but. Probably have to wait till
next week to figure out if there's a standalone
one. We'll have to keep an eye on Shaq to see
what he has to say about things because Shaq
knows all about 5G. But so I actually, I saw
this item on your list. And so I did a quick
search on the Ookla database and I can tell you
that current speeds in Turkey as of February,
2026. Now this is across all providers in Turkey
and across all mobile technologies. Current median
speed of mobile networks in Turkey is about 54
megabits a second. Not terrible. Yeah, exactly.
It certainly does sound like 4G. And I thought
what was interesting is we can separate out the
5G speeds. We are within the results we are starting
to see a pretty significant uptick in some early
5G testing there in Turkey. And some of the early
speed results we're starting to see. are in the
500 megabytes to 600 megabytes per second range.
Though typically after a launch, those speeds
go down as you have a lot of users on the network.
So I wouldn't expect those speeds to stay there.
But certainly it's an indication that Turkey,
and actually we do see other countries, I cover
Latin America pretty closely. There are some
countries in Latin America where operators have
decided just not to launch 5G yet. They're holding
off until it makes more financial sense to launch.
certainly in smaller countries, than 86 million.
I couldn't resist this pun. Sounds like it's
going to be a slam dunk. Oh, there we go. Well
done. I have nothing better to add to that. That's
as good as it's going to get right there. Speaking
of slam dunks. Yes. Speaking of slam dunks. Ooh,
good call. So my final topic that I wanted to
talk about today is one near and dear to my heart.
It's all about space. And there's a couple of
elements here. I think from a, from an industry
standpoint, this week was the satellite show.
I think it's in Washington, DC. I have never
been able to go. I've always wanted to, wasn't
able to go this time around, but there was lots
of news that came out of the satellite show this
week. Amazon talked about the fact that they're
trying to increase the number of launches for
their Amazon Leo low earth orbit satellite internet
service. Lots of other announcements at that
show as well. I think, but the big announcement,
to come out of that show was actually not from
a satellite company. It was from NASA. And so
NASA this week announced that they are moving
up the timeline to build a base on the moon,
which is very exciting, I think, for all of us.
And actually, there is a telecom component to
that because NASA has been investigating what
the telecom network ought to be on the moon.
And there's a whole project within NASA. I think
it's called LunaNet. But it's literally a private
wireless network on the moon and, you know, how
to get all the astronauts connected on the moon
and then send transmissions back to earth and
that kind of stuff. But just, it's a very, it's
very exciting to see. We've got Starlink's IPO,
SpaceX's IPO may be coming within the next few
weeks. We just found out that SpaceX Starlink
is going to be one of the bidders in the FCC's
upcoming AWS3 spectrum auction. They'll probably
bid for spectrum. for their direct -to -device
service, which is powered by all the satellites
that SpaceX has been launching. And I think,
so just a lot of stuff going on in the space
industry, on the space frontier. But I think,
so that's interesting, I think, from an industry
perspective. But taking one step back as just
a person and a citizen of the U .S., and I actually
saw you treated this out today, too, so you're
aware of it, but the Artemis II launch. happens
next week on Wednesday. And it is the first human
space travel out of Earth's orbit since the 1970s.
So the Artemis 2 mission is sending a crew of
four to the moon. They're going to go around
the moon, spend 10 days traveling around the
moon, and they'll come back after 10 days. So
they won't land on the moon, but they'll go around
the moon in advance of potential construction
of the beginning of constructing a lunar base
in 2028. When you couple that activity with the
big movie this week is Project Hail Mary. It's
all about space travel. There's a TV show on
Amazon or on Apple called For All Mankind. And
it's a great TV show. They just released another
season. It's all about space travel and landing
on the moon. So I think it's interesting from
an industry perspective. But even just a step
back, it is interesting from just a human being
perspective. The idea of... Humanity returning
back to the moon and hopefully traveling beyond
the moon. It is very inspiring. Certainly Godspeed
to the crew of Artemis II who are headed out
hopefully next week. Safe travels to them. And
I'm certainly going to be watching it with great
anticipation, that launch and their whole 10
-day mission that starts next week. I just, I
feel like there's a few things that you can just
really get excited about just as a person. And
so this, in my mind, this is one of them. Artemis
II mission. Dude, I am down. I'm going to watch
that. I'm so excited for that. So I'm hopeful
for the, for a successful launch and for a good
mission for them. And I'm going to be watching
it super close. I will be too. I'm also super
excited about it because I'm always, I've always
been big on space travel. I think it will be
something that occurs more frequently in the
next few decades. I think we still have some
biological issues we need to solve with our human
bodies before we really take to the stars, but.
I wish they were landing on the moon. I think
that would be more fun. We would need to have
a lander for that. But I also think that, to
your point, stuff like Perfect Home Area, I saw
that in 70mm last week. It was awesome. You liked
it? It was a good movie? Enjoyed it. It was a
good movie. Well shot, good music, good balance,
good acting. Well balanced. And yeah, I think
this whole industry, we also have been talking
about space data centers for the last few months.
I think that's a little bit overhyped, to be
honest with you. I think this was something that's
pushed potentially to get their IPO valuation
to $1 .5 trillion territory. I think that whole
hodgepodge of companies, whatever you want to
call it, you want to call it, I think it's a
little overvalued. Twitter is part of it now,
essentially. I don't know what people are actually
bidding on when it comes to the IPO. But truthfully,
I think SpaceX and Starlink have a lot going
on for them. And yeah, I think we're just in
this run up. We've talked about this a few times.
I think 2027 is going to be the culmination of
a lot of these efforts and 2026 is going to be
putting those satellites up in the air to make
those things possible in 2027. I'm excited about
it. I was one of the first people to write up
T -Mobile's Starlink deployment with SpaceX.
And I will continue to try and be at the edge
of whatever is possible with satellite communications.
I will tell you my own data. Starlink is extremely
popular in places where there's just no infrastructure.
Oil and gas, they use it almost 100%. Because
there's so many places where they're operating
out of that. Starlink is their only. Starlink
does really enable a lot of things that we're
not really aware of because we're not in those
industries. Having competition from Amazon. with
Leo will be great because they need competition.
Everybody needs competition. Nobody should be
a monopoly. That's not how capitalism works successfully.
I'm looking forward to seeing Amazon be more
aggressive and also more competition. Although
it's quite clear that they're much more of an
enterprise play, but I think that's really where
there's a lot of money in this whole satellite
push because consumers are going to want more
and pay less. And that's not really great for
satellite because that's what's sunk most of
the last. A few constellations that went bankrupt.
Yeah, I'm excited. Lots going on, like you said.
And yeah, I'm just happy to see more stuff going
up in the sky. I hope one day they will actually
go to a launch and witness it in person, whether
it's over in April or you're on the west coast
in Lompoc. So yeah, I love watching launches,
especially since they launched southward in San
Diego and they actually come through our sky
and we get the swirls and the trails and it's
gorgeous. Highly recommended. Try and see if
I can watch it. Unfortunately, the timing is
like literally as I'm driving from San Francisco
to Sonoma. So I might not be able to watch, but
I might listen. We just have it on in the car
as I'm driving. Yeah. Wednesday morning. I think
I'll be in the office. I think I might put it
on the big screen TV and have everybody in the
office watch too. So I'm excited for it. I think
it'll be great. That Artemis launch. Yeah. I
think that kind of wraps things up for us. We
hope our viewers and listeners found this week's
topics interesting. If anyone would like to provide
insights on a future topic for... future podcasts,
please reach out to us on social media. I'm at
onshore sod and Mike's at Mikey data. And we
hope you don't forget to rate us and subscribe
and we'll see you again.