SpaceX recently completed the largest IPO in history, and the prospectus confirmed that Starlink, its satellite broadband arm, generates the group's profits. Subsequently, South Africa, which has kept Starlink out over local ownership rules, launched a state-backed satellite company of its own. The two developments frame the same market from opposite sides. Satellite broadband in low Earth orbit (LEO) offers the continent a route past a connectivity deficit that continues to constrain growth. It also rests on terms that a growing number of African regulators are unwilling to accept without competition and a degree of control.
Why Orbit Is Cheaper Than Trenching
Africa carries the widest connectivity gap in the world. Mobile technologies contributed $240bn to African economies in 2025, some 7.8% of regional GDP that year, yet almost one billion people, 63% of the population, live within reach of a mobile broadband signal and do not use it. On the other hand, smaller and largely rural population sit outside of coverage altogether. Satellites in low Earth orbit change what it costs to reach them. Orbiting at between 500 and 1,200km against the 36,000 km of geostationary systems, they cut latency to a level that supports video conferencing, online learning, and telemedicine, and they cover a village or a mine without the long period of exploration or a new tower.
They can also carry backhaul for mobile operators, extending existing cellular networks. Crucially, fibre internet requires expensive infrastructure, and is fragile in its own way. On March 2024, for instance, four subsea cables were severed off Côte d'Ivoire, degrading or cutting internet services across 13 countries.
Owning the Rocket Built Starlink's Lead
Starlink is by far the dominating player in the market globally. SpaceX launched its first 60 satellites in 2019 and had put 10,790 into orbit by the end of 2025. Its connectivity arm booked revenue of $11.39bn in 2025, roughly 61% of the group total and its only profitable segment, and served 10.3m subscribers across 164 markets by 31 March 2026. Africa arrived later and retains a small share of that base: commercial service began in Nigeria in 2023 and reached 26 markets and about 300,000 subscribers by June 2026, with roughly 64% of that base concentrated in three markets: Nigeria, Zimbabwe, and Zambia. The lead rests on owning the rocket. SpaceX launched its own constellation on reusable vehicles, a benchmark no rival can match: of roughly 650 orbital launches by 31 March 2026, more than 540 used a Falcon booster that had flown before.
Whether that growth continues depends on factors the company does not control: what regulators permit, what governments make of its owner, and what households can afford.
Ownership Rules Decide Market Entry
Two of the continent's markets have kept Starlink out on ownership grounds. Namibia's regulator rejected its licence applications on 23 March 2026 and dismissed the appeals on 22 June, citing section 46 of the Communications Act, which requires licence holders to be at least 51% Namibian owned; Starlink's local entity had no Namibian shareholders and no ministerial exemption. South Africa applies a lower threshold to the same principle, requiring 30% ownership by historically disadvantaged groups under the Electronic Communications Act of 2005.
The objection is not only legal. Musk, who was born in South Africa, has publicly attacked the country's empowerment legislation as racially discriminatory, a characterisation Pretoria rejects. The dispute has coloured every discussion of Starlink's entry. Beyond Africa, the service has demonstrated what a private constellation can do in wartime, becoming central to Ukrainian military communications, and what it can do to a government's control of information, as seen during protests in Iran. Those episodes cut both ways for African regulators. A network that cannot be switched off by the ministry is precisely what makes it valuable during an outage and precisely what makes it a liability during political instability.
However, price is the constraint no ministry can lift. Monthly plans run from roughly $30–55 across the continent, but the terminal costs around $380. This means that the barrier sits in the first payment rather than the subscription. Nigeria shows the implications of the arrangement in the largest market: the hardware alone approaches a third of annual income per head before a single monthly bill is accounted for.
Who could challenge Starlink's lead?
China is furthest along in ambition and furthest behind in orbit. Qianfan, backed by the Shanghai municipal government, had roughly 200 satellites aloft by June 2026 against a target of 15,000 by 2030. Guowang, run by a central state holding company, had around 168 and aims for 400 by 2027 out of 12,992 filed with the International Telecommunication Union. The binding constraint is launch. State programmes have repeatedly slipped against their own schedules, which is part of why Beijing has leaned harder on private space firms. Moreover, the chokepoint is reusability: analysts at MERICS argue that a breakthrough in resusability would translate into more deployed satellites, given China's progress in adjacent technologies and the scale of its electronics supply chain.
What Beijing offers is a different product rather than a cheaper version of the same one. While Starlink routes traffic beyond the reach of national authorities (which is why it registers in China as a problem before it is deemed a competitor), Qianfan sells wholesale to licensed national operators, an architecture that leaves the switch inside the country. For governments that have suspended networks during elections or unrest, that is a specification rather than a compromise. The precedent is Huawei, whose expansion across African telecoms rested on supplying infrastructure that ministries could work with as much as on price.
Amazon has everything except the rocket. Its Leo constellation, formerly Project Kuiper, reached 396 satellites by early July 2026 against the 578 needed for its first phase. It secured a Nigerian landing permit effective February 2026, and can absorb hardware costs across cloud and retail in a way a standalone operator cannot. The weaknesses, however, are timing and structure. Its success depends on launch vehicles it does not fully control, and coverage fills from the higher latitudes downward, so the equatorial band arrives last. Its ownership is also as foreign as Starlink's, which leaves it exposed to the same statutes in Windhoek and Pretoria.
Europe sells to a different customer and, in doing so, sidesteps the problem that has stalled Starlink. Eutelsat OneWeb's 648 satellites serve carriers, aviation, and governments rather than households, an arrangement that keeps the licence, the ownership, and the customer relationship inside the country. IRIS², a €10.6bn constellation, which is largely funded by public money and built by a consortium of Eutelsat, Hispasat, and SES, extends that logic to secure institutional connectivity. The limits are equally structural. Enterprise terminals cost thousands of dollars against a few hundred for a consumer satellite, there is no residential product at all, and IRIS² is not expected to enter service until around the end of the decade.
Looking ahead
Satellite broadband reaches the minority who live beyond any network. The majority already covered and priced out, sits on the ground, in the cost of a terminal and the tax on a handset. What low Earth orbit changes is the number of suppliers a government can choose between, and therefore the terms it can set.
Starlink will hold most of the market for some years, because a launch cadence takes longer to copy than a satellite, licences and ownership rules will decide which constellations arrive and on whose terms. Device costs, import duties, and household income will determine whether Africa’s population can benefit from increasing technological advancements or remain beholden to external forces.
