According to The Wall Street Journal, SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service generated revenues of $1.4 billion in the past year, a substantial leap from 2021 when it earned $222 million.
While the increase in revenues is significant, it falls short of the expectations set by CEO Elon Musk during his 2015 investor presentation.
Musk had claimed that Starlink would achieve operational profits of $7 billion in 2022 and generate revenues of approximately $12 billion.
Reports suggest that Starlink has also been slower to acquire customers than Musk anticipated, with around one million active subscribers by the end of 2022, in contrast to Musk’s projection of 20 million subscribers by the same time.
In October 2022, Musk tweeted that Starlink was losing around $20 million per month to maintain its services.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) previously questioned the credibility of Starlink after the service received $885.5 million in grant funds, however, the FCC later reversed its decision, citing Starlink’s failure to meet program requirements.
Jessica Rosenworcel, Chairwoman of the FCC, stated in a letter rejecting support for Starlink under the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund program, “We decline these requests after careful legal, technical, and policy review.
Consumers deserve high-speed, affordable, and reliable broadband, and we cannot bear the cost of supporting projects that do not deliver on promised speeds or are unlikely to meet program requirements as we move to a digital future that requires robust and fast networks.”
Starlink currently has around 4,200 satellites in low Earth orbit, providing coverage in 60 countries, and continues to attract new consumers through various offers.
The Wall Street Journal’s report comes on the same day that Jonathan Hofeller, Vice President of Commercial Sales at Starlink, announced that the company is no longer losing money on producing satellite dishes.
