SpaceX has picked Qualcomm to supply the base-station technology for Starlink Mobile's terrestrial 5G network in the United States. The multi-year agreement, announced on November 4, 2026, is a concrete step toward SpaceX building its own phone network, combining satellite coverage with ground infrastructure.
What Qualcomm will supply
Under the deal, SpaceX will use Qualcomm's Dragonwing QRU100 and QDU100 platforms plus commercial-grade Layer 1 software. The QRU100 handles processing in Massive MIMO radio units, while the QDU100 provides low-latency, power-efficient baseband processing in the distributed unit.
The terrestrial network will use Massive MIMO radios with 64 transmit and 64 receive paths (64T64R), designed to improve coverage, capacity and spectral efficiency. Deployment is planned to begin in 2027, with tens of thousands of sites over the life of the agreement. Financial terms were not disclosed.
"Together with SpaceX, we are building world-leading cellular infrastructure in the United States, advancing 5G today, with an opportunity to lay the foundation for AI-native 6G in the years ahead," said Durga Malladi, EVP at Qualcomm Technologies. Michael Nicolls, SVP of Starlink, said the company is building the first fully integrated US nationwide satellite and terrestrial network.
What was not announced matters too: the release includes no live sites, coverage map, price plan or market-by-market schedule. A figure of around 80,000 sites cited in some coverage traces to earlier reporting on tower-access talks, not to a contractual commitment in Qualcomm's announcement, which refers only to tens of thousands of sites. The 6G reference is a longer-term direction, not a commercial 6G launch.
Sources: Qualcomm's official release of November 4, 2026; PhoneArena; Telecompetitor.
Image credit: Starlink, via PhoneArena.
Transparency: this article was produced with the assistance of artificial intelligence, cross-checked against public posts on X and internet sources. Please consult the original sources to confirm the details.
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