TAMPA, Fla. — United Airlines is replacing multiple geostationary operators with Starlink in SpaceX’s largest aviation Wi-Fi deal, shaking up the last satellite broadband market where the low Earth orbit (LEO) constellation had yet to gain significant traction.
The U.S. carrier announced plans Sept. 13 to start equipping the more than 1,000 planes in its international fleet with Starlink connectivity next year, following tests slated for early 2025.
Nicole Carriere, a spokesperson for United, declined to comment on rollout timing and details by aircraft type but said the company will transition from current Wi-Fi partners Viasat, Panasonic, Thales and Intelsat in “a multi-year process.”
United, which has more routes across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans than any other airline, plans to offer passengers high-speed, low-latency Starlink Wi-Fi for free.
“Everything you can do on the ground, you’ll soon be able to do onboard a United plane at 35,000 feet, just about anywhere in the world,” United CEO Scott Kirby said in a statement.
According to United, supported Starlink services would include live streaming, gaming and the ability to connect multiple devices at once under one user.
Evolving competition
The announcement surprised analysts, including William Blair’s Louie DiPalma, who said Viasat’s inflight connectivity service has been considered the gold standard in the industry.
“We expected that Starlink would win the Panasonic Avionics (wide bodies) and IntelSat (regional) equipped aircraft, but not the 536 ViaSat-equipped planes (336 of which are indirectly served through Thales Aerospace),” he wrote.
According to DiPalma, Viasat currently dominates commercial inflight connectivity with 3,750 commercial aircraft in service and another 1,460 in backlog.
Essentially all new planes for United, American Airlines, Southwest, and JetBlue come pre-installed with Viasat Wi-Fi, DiPalma added, and the geostationary operator…
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