FCC grants waiver to Amazon Leo constellation, despite its failure to launch on time
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) yesterday granted [pdf] a license waiver to Amazon, allowing it to continue deploying its Leo constellation even though the company will fail to meet its license requirement to get half its constellation (1,616 satellites) into orbit by July 2026.
While granting the waiver, the FCC also made it clear Amazon still needs to meet the license’s deadline for full deployment of all 3,232 satellites by July 30, 2029.
In the event Amazon Leo fails to satisfy the final milestone on July 30, 2029, this will result in reduction of the total number of Amazon Leo’s authorized satellites to the total number of satellites that are operational on that date.
In other words, the Leo constellation will be truncated if Amazon fails to get the full constellation up on time.
To further encourage Amazon to meet future deadlines, the FCC also stated that the satellites of Amazon’s first-half constellation that are launched late — after the July 2026 deadline — will lose certain spectrum rights for the next 20 months, “or until 50% of the constellation is launched and operational, whichever occurs first.” This order is expressly designed to encourage the company to accelerate its launch pace.
Finally, the FCC declared that Amazon will forfeit its surety bond for not meeting its July 30, 2026 launch obligation.
Launching almost 3,000 satellites in the next three years is still going to be challenging. Right now Amazon is dependent mostly on two grounded and as yet unproven rockets (Vulcan and New Glenn) and a third (Ariane-6) that cannot launch at a very quick pace for at least another two years. And its additional a ten-launch contract with SpaceX won’t be sufficient to get the entire constellation in orbit on time.
In other words, unless Vulcan and New Glenn get fixed quickly and resume launches, Amazon is going to have trouble meeting the FCC’s final deadline.
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Whoever it is at Amazon that has Shotwell on their speed-dial had best get on the horn.
33-34 SpaceX shots/year devoted to nothing but launching their sats, 102 total – assuming nothing goes wrong with any sat
Yeah, they’re gonna need some more help from SpaceX launch services to make that deadline.
Elon shows up a Jeff’s front door…. wearing the actual Fonzie jacket…. thumbs-up. “Heeeeeeey!!”
Elon might want to turn him down—anyone named “Jeff” has nothing but bad luck and is a jinx—trust me…I know.
Elon does need to turn him down.
Its not in Elons best interests to launch anything associated with Amazon.
Amazon has the cash to find and fund another launch company.
If Elon wants to launch those sats he should ‘make a deal’. Enough shares to have a seat on the board. to start.
pzatchok, SpaceX has always been quite open to launching competitors’ satellites. I expect they’ll happily take Amazon’s money to launch more of Leo.
They have been happy to launch other sats.’
‘
Are any of them direct competitors to their business. Amazon would be.
He could make a deal that he keeps making monthly income from Amazons service. Not just the launches, which could end at any time a competitor takes his place.
pzatchok: I’ve noted repeatedly in posts and comments that SpaceX has gladly launched numerous competitors to Starlink (OneWeb, Leo, AST SpaceMobile, Viasat to name a few) when they need the launch services.
It does this 1. to make some money. 2. to avoid any anti-trust accusations. SpaceX the launch provider mustn’t appear to be excluding competitors to SpaceX the Starlink provider, or else it would face lawsuits and regulatory government attacks it wishes to avoid.
It’s mainly anti-trust
Partly, I’m sure. But mostly it’s just the knowledge that all of these guys have an insuperable economic disadvantage compared to Starlink.
Several named by Robert Z. plus Iridium, Orbcomm and Globalstar would at least like to think of themselves as direct competitors to Starlink. SpaceX is happy to launch their birds because launch revenue is launch revenue. And I don’t think SpaceX really sees these guys as genuine competitors to Starlink. Starlink not only has first-mover advantage it has an insuperable cost advantage.
Robert wrote: In other words, unless Vulcan and New Glenn get fixed quickly and resume launches, Amazon is going to have trouble meeting the FCC’s final deadline.
In addition, Leo (née Kuiper) may need to increase its manufacture rate. It is unclear to me whether Leo has already built the remaining twelve hundred or so satellites that were needed by July 30 but cannot launch them. I suspect they haven’t completed them, because they could otherwise have hired SpaceX to put them in orbit on time.
The only prayer they have is convincing Elon to build one or two falcon boosters dedicated to BO