🚀 T-Mobile & SpaceX Link Up

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The Space Scoop

Week Ended 08.26.2022

Happy Friday! A quiet week turned noisy was led by a T-Mobile SpaceX partnership announcement, changes to SatixFy's SPAC merger, positive NASA news for Orbital Reef space station and Astra officially becoming a penny stock. Lets dive in.

📈 Market Max-Q

S&P 500: 4,057.66 -4.0%NASDAQ: 12,141.72 -4.5%UFO: 21.30 -2.1%ROKT: 38.30 -3.1%ARKX: 14.62 -4.0%SSIT: 62.6 +1.8%SPIR: 1.47 +6.5%SATL: 4.60 +5.5%LLAP: 4.05 -8.2%ASTR: 0.94 -24.1%1W return as of 4:00pm EDT.

🚀 Top Stories

1) T-Mobile ($TMUS) and SpaceX announced Thursday evening plans to collaborate and create a new network that directly connects cellphones to Starlink satellites.

• The companies are planning to provide customers text coverage practically everywhere in the continental US, Hawaii, parts of Alaska, Puerto Rico and territorial waters even outside the signal of T-Mobile’s network. The service will begin with a beta by the end of next year.

• TLDR: Per Elon Musk's Twitter fingers: "Starlink V2, launching next year, will transmit direct to mobile phones, eliminating dead zones worldwide."

 2) SatixFy and SPAC sponsor Endurance Acquisition Corp. ($EDNC) announced a transaction valuation cut by -55% to $365M. 

• The satellite technology company originally announced the proposed merger in March 2022 at an $813M valuation. The amendment waives the deal’s minimum cash condition and introduced sponsor concessions of forfeiting 800,000 promote shares (~16%). The agreement’s September 8th termination date will now be November 7th.

• While no reason was stated, one can only assume market conditions for SPACs, especially Space SPACs, are to blame. The question is why is SatixFy still pursuing the SPAC? Is it a decision revolving around their cash position? The company decided not to follow in Tomorrow.io and D-Orbit's footsteps of fully terminating the merger agreements. 

 3) Sierra Space and Blue Origin successfully completed Orbital Reef system definition review (SDR) with NASA.

• This important milestone establishes the functional baseline for Orbital Reef, which demonstrates to NASA the design is feasible and achievable while validating the system is on-track to proceed into the design phase. It now advances on to the design phase.

🛰️ In Other News

Violet Labs Raises $4M Seed Round 

(TechCrunch)

The startup founded by ex-Amazon satellite engineers aggregates data from software tools used across the hardware design lifecycle into a powerful centralized platform. The round was led by Space Capital, with participation from MaC Venture Capital, Felicis and V1.VC.

ATLAS Space Operations Raises $26M Series B 

(Company)

The investment in the cloud-based space communications solutions provider will accelerate its plan for international growth and its ground software-as-a-service business model. The round was led by Mitsui & Co. with participation from Beringea, Boomerang Catapult, Rise of the Rest, VCapital, Northern Michigan Angels, Harmonix, Wakestream, and Grand Ventures.

📊 Chart of the Week

Per astronomer Jonathan McDowell, a summary of active satellite payloads versus time covering 1957 to 2021. What are the repercussions, good or bad? Something to ponder this weekend.. 

🔗 Links

• Space Force Chief of Space Operations Visits Terran Orbital’s ($LLAP) Irvine Facilities• Planet ($PL) Certifies Three Partners in New Planet Orbit Certification Program• Intelsat Working To Regain Control of Galaxy 15 Satellite• Five Companies Win $4.8B in Contracts From NASIC• Terran Orbital ($LLAP) Integrates LunIR Into NASA SLS• Sidus Space ($SIDU) Signs MOU With Exo-Space To Support Edge Computing Technology• Planet ($PL) To Provide Real-Time Data and Connectivity Solutions to SES and Telesat ($TSAT) for NASA’s CSP• Globalstar ($GSAT) and Globalsat To Deploy IoT Solution for Monitoring of Renewable Energy Stations in Latin America• Rocket Lab ($RKLB) Releases ESG Impact Report• Redwire ($RDW) To Provide Imaging and Navigation Technology on NASA’s Artemis I Mission• BlackSky ($BKSY) Awarded $1.7M NASA Contract To Advance Earth Science Research

🗣️ Opinion

• U.S. Government Effort To Tap Private Weather Data Moves Along Slowly• The Space Launch System Is America’s Space Program• AST SpaceMobile ($ASTS): September Launching and Successful Testing Could Unlock a $1.1T+ TAM• NASA Is Going to the Moon – Will These Stocks Benefit?• Astra Space ($ASTR): A Former High-Flier, Now an Earnings Loser, With a Bearish Chart

📅 Earnings Calendar

• $PL: September 12 - After Market Close

*Company confirmed dates only.