SatShow - Live in the Booth with AST SpaceMobile President Scott Wisniewski

[00:00:06] Speaker A: This is the AST SpaceMobile Podcast. It will just basically come to your phone and be seamless regardless of where you are. We don't want the user even to know that it's connected by satellite. Listen, the opportunity that we have is very, very, very large.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: Hi, we are live in the booth with Via Satellite at The Sat Show. I'm Rachel Jewett, Senior Managing Editor of Via Satellite. I'm here with my colleague Mark Holmes, Senior Editorial Director, and we're thrilled to be interviewing Scott Wisniewski, President and Chief Strategy Officer of AST SpaceMobile. Scott, thanks for joining us today.
[00:00:42] Speaker C: Thank you for having us.
[00:00:43] Speaker B: Yeah, so AST SpaceMobile, you've recently unfolded the BlueBird 6 satellite, which is the largest commercial communications array antenna Truly wild to see that in space. What's the status of the satellite in orbit, and can you talk us through the launch plans coming up this year?
[00:01:02] Speaker C: Sure. Well, this is our first next-generation satellite.
[00:01:04] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:01:05] Speaker C: When you think about the direct-to-device industry that we're creating, you know, we wanna be broadband. You know, broadband is our strategy, and you get to broadband with big satellites. So that's why we designed and built outta Texas this satellite. It's the biggest ever. It's 3.5 times larger than our last 5 satellites, which were also the biggest ever. So it's going great. We launched it just before Christmas out of India, and we unfolded it successfully several weeks ago, a little over a month ago. And that satellite is performing very well. It's done everything it's supposed to do. The hardest part is unfolding well, and that went successfully, which is great. And next, we're getting ready to release it for customer use. And so it's this challenge of communicating with a big satellite moving 4 miles a second, 500 miles away to a regular phone with no changes to the phone is a very significant one. And getting all that calibrated within our architecture is a key effort. And so this is really the first big satellite that we're able to do that with and build on that. And then throughout the year, we're going to be launching more and more birds.
[00:02:10] Speaker D: Okay, we can go on to the next question. Spectrum for D2D has been such a key topic of conversation in the last few months after SpaceX's spectrum purchase and AST SpaceMobile's own deal with Legado for spectrum. Can you talk about why this spectrum deal was important and will AST SpaceMobile be looking for access to even more MSS spectrum?
[00:02:32] Speaker C: Sure. So spectrum is critical in telecom.
[00:02:36] Speaker B: Right?
[00:02:37] Speaker C: We all know that. And from the beginning of the company, we designed our strategy around using cellular spectrum, the spectrum of our partners. And we've been really good at building the ecosystem and building our partner base. We think we're the partner of choice with indirect-to-device. And so we've done that with an add-on product that can grow revenue for the operators, improve their network characteristics from reducing churn. And in doing that, we can also use stranded spectrum or loose spectrum assets and kind of recycle it through our our large array. And so that's been our strategy from the beginning and it's still our core strategy. However, if you could have more spectrum, you would, right? And so that's why a little over a year ago, we signed an agreement for long-term access rights with the L-band in the United States and Canada. And since then, we also acquired a company with ITU rights to the S-band globally. And at the core of it is more spectrum is better. It means more services, more subscribers. And it's also a strategic asset that we can control within our company and bring to bear through our partners. So it's a key part of our strategy now. I think it was one that we got out ahead of when we did our deal, which is great. And it's clear that that's the right strategy for the industry is to combine both backwards-compatible 3GPP spectrum access with our partners while also bringing spectrum to the party to improve services.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. And The— just seeing the different operators, like before it was just working with telco spectrum, but there's really been a shift to companies wanting to have their own spectrum rights for D2D. So it's been interesting to watch. At Mobile World Congress, you announced an agreement with Orange covering both Europe and the rest of the world. Can you talk about the significance of this? And I know you have a lot of mobile network operators, but the significance of this particular one with Orange.
[00:04:21] Speaker C: Yeah, and we really do view ourselves as the partner of choice for mobile network operators as they think about direct-to-device. And that's because we help build their business together. We have a very friendly architecture with how we build. We're broadband, not narrowband. These are all things that are very valuable as they build their network. And so we have over 50 mobile network operators, many of whom are investors, who have nearly 3 billion subscribers amongst them. So that brings us to Orange. So Orange is one of the most significant players in Europe as well as Africa. And so we've had a long-term relationship with Orange and they've been very eager to develop our services with us. And so this new agreement through SATCO in Europe, which is our joint venture, as well as in Africa, is very significant because what it means is that we can bring more operators to bear. It's not just Vodafone in Europe and it's not just one player in Africa. So I think our desire is to be have open access with all operators. We think we're the partner of choice for that. And Orange is another step in that direction. We also signed Telefónica, Vodafone Ukraine, which is different than Vodafone, and several others across Europe during that important conference.
[00:05:31] Speaker D: I just want to follow up on that. I mean, you mentioned you've signed a number of deals at Mobile World Congress this year. Given the deals that you've already done, what does the deal flow look like for AST over, say, the next 12 months? And if we're having this conversation in 12 months' time live in the booth, how many sort of contracts, deals would you expect to do within that timeframe?
[00:05:54] Speaker C: And just to refresh, you know, we have signed deals and gotten investment with AT&T and Verizon in the US, Bell and TELUS in Canada, Vodafone in Europe, Rakuten in Japan, American Tower and Google are also investors. So these are pretty significant moves that we've made, including signing a large 10-year deal with STC. across the Middle East and North Africa. So these are all really important to how we think about building the ecosystem. We can't go it alone. We don't want to. The 6 billion phones in circulation represents an enormous market opportunity that we're very excited about. So how to think about that with us? So we are planning to roll out our network this year, more next year, but a significant amount of it this year in order to launch commercial services this year. And as we do that, market by market, we need to think about how we're bringing operators onto the network. So today, We have signed definitive commercial agreements with AT&T and Verizon and Vodafone and STC. And so what you're going to see from us is going in deeper with our relationships with our customers, bringing more people onto the network with very detailed legal constructs that allow them to basically offer this to all of their subscribers and give us a vehicle to improve their network. So you're going to see us getting in deeper with all of our relationships today. You'll see a few new ones. There's a few that aren't yet on the network, but primarily you're going to see us going deeper throughout the course of 2026 with our existing base.
[00:07:17] Speaker B: Is there a particular region of the world that you think has really, like, particularly strong potential for consumer adoption for D2D?
[00:07:25] Speaker C: Yeah, it's a great question because the world is very large, right? And the funny thing about space is you'll see a lot of companies who say, well, I'm gonna build a network, but it's global. You need 10 years, $10 billion, and it's a very problematic challenge. And so as we think about prioritizing markets, we've gone in deep with our partners, obviously. And some of our partners are in the US and Canada and Europe and Japan and the US government. And so those are very logical places to start. But what we've found is that the consumer wants to be connected. We all know this. In the last 30, 40 years, we've all gotten a computer on our desk and a phone in our pocket. That's how we stay connected to the world. And what we see is market by market, the demand shape might be a little different, but the desire to have connectivity both as a marketing ploy and as a network solve is very significant, whether that's people with ability to pay who want the convenience factor, people who legitimately don't have good connectivity and will pay as a portion of their disposable income, or people that just want to have that promise fulfilled of being connected all the time, which increasingly we need and are desperate to have. So that's really what we see in every market, really, with limited exception. We've seen significant demand from from all the major markets. We, of course, are gonna prioritize the big markets first.
[00:08:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:43] Speaker C: But we see a demand curve that we can monetize and help the operators support their network across the world.
[00:08:50] Speaker B: Yeah. So we've been talking about commercial, and I wanna ask a little bit about the defense business. So the company recently got a big Space Development Agency contract and the first overall award for the SDA's Europa effort. So can you give us a little bit more context on what AST SpaceMobile will be doing for Space Development Agency? And then Kind of the significance of what this award means?
[00:09:11] Speaker C: Sure. And the defense market is a good one for space. You know, we've primarily built our business around the commercial market, but if we were a space company to build only around the commercial market, we'd be the first ever. So the defense market has made a lot of sense over the last couple years as we've deployed network, and they've seen what this kind of brand new, one-of-a-kind architecture can do. Because when you have a large array in low Earth orbit, it facilitates a number of communications and non-communications use cases. So today, what you've seen is over 10 contracts that we've signed over the last 2 years, including testing we're doing on orbit today for radar applications, for many different types of communications applications, some that are solved today, others that are not solved today. Anytime you want to do radar, you want to have a big antenna, and we have a very big array in low Earth orbit. And anytime you want to talk to something that's more than just a backpack or an antenna on a plane. You want to have something that's low profile, that is 3GPP compatible, that can do a number of different waveforms. So what you're seeing from us is a number of contracts, several with the SDA, including the most recent one for Europa, which will develop a number of specific secure communications capabilities that ultimately will feed large contracts. And so for us, the vision that we've painted is one where we have up to 10 different use cases in communications and non-communications, each of which could be a future program of record for the US government and a very valuable asset for Americans.
[00:10:43] Speaker D: And just one very, very quick question before we wrap up. You talked about the defense market there, and I'm just sort of curious in terms of like the revenue balance between defense and commercial, maybe in 3 years' time, what would you expect that balance to be?
[00:10:59] Speaker C: Yeah, so it's a great question. And we're building a new market and the market sizes put forward for directed advice are quite astronomical. So we know that we're going to be leading that market, we're going to be pushing that market, and we're going to be developing that market in a very good way with our partners. But the split between, we think both commercial and government could be billion-dollar businesses for us, multi-billion-dollar businesses for us. over the long run. And in the near term, we'll probably see a balance kind of 50/50, maybe even skewed a little towards defense. But over time, we expect commercial to outpace it. And that's a key part of our strategy in 2027 and 2028.
[00:11:35] Speaker D: Okay. Well, Scott, it's been an absolute pleasure to talk to you today. It's great to talk to a company with such big and bold ambitions like AST SpaceMobile. We wish you a great rest of SatShow and all the best for the rest of the year. Thank you for your time.
[00:11:47] Speaker C: Thank you very much for having us.
[00:11:50] Speaker A: Thanks for listening to the AST SpaceMobile Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others, post about it on social media, or leave a rating and review. To catch all the latest news about AST SpaceMobile, make sure to subscribe. Thanks again, and I'll see you next time. something very, very big, and I think with this technology we can really affect a billion lives. AST SpaceMobile is the only company that has proven technology to deliver cellular mobile connectivity directly from space to the everyday smartphone. People will just basically turn on their phone and be seamless regardless of where you are. We don't want the user even to know that it's connected by satellite. Our role is to bring this into reality, always in partnership with the MMOs. Listen. Mmm, waffles.