Satellite internet provider Intelsat has asked the Federal Communications Commission to reject an application from Elon Musk's private space company SpaceX for permission to test its proposed satellite internet service.
SpaceX hopes to build a large constellation of small, low earth orbit satellites capable of blanketing the globe in wireless internet coverage. Such a service would obviously be a threat to Intelsat's existing business model. But at the moment, Intelsat's concerns are technological. It's worried that SpaceX's experimental satellites could interrupt its own services and is asking the FCC to require SpaceX to disclose more information about its plans, even though the company has requested to keep much of this information confidential.
"SpaceX has failed to show that it would not interfere with licensed
geostationary satellites," Intelsat general counsel Susan H. Crandall wrote in a letter to the FCC spotted by Vice Motherboard.
SpaceX claimed in its application for the experimental license that "interference with other systems is very unlikely." But Intelstat isn't buying it.
"The information that SpaceX is seeking to withhold is the kind of basic information that is routinely, and publicly, filed by other satellite operators (both GSO and NGSO) in applications seeking FCC authorizations," Crandall wrote. "The information withheld is critical to any analysis of potential interference."
