The aerospace company SpaceX has been awarded the sum of $885 million in federal subsidies from the US government under a program from the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that doled out $9.2 billion in aid to dozens of companies for the deployment of high-speed broadband internet service to underserved rural areas.

The FCC awarded nearly $900 million in aid to SpaceX for its Starlink satellite internet network which is still in the works. Starlink consists of a planned constellation of 42,000 satellites that’ll beam internet access to areas on Earth. So far, it’s gotten approval from the FCC to launch 12,000 satellites and has launched nearly 1,000 satellites for the initial phase.

Starlink satellite deployed over Earth.

The Covid-19 pandemic this year has proved the importance of high-speed internet access as a utility, whereas rural areas in the US are usually underserved and don’t have access to the high-speed internet access available in cities. For reference, the Covid-19 pandemic saw schools widely resort to online learning, whereas areas lacking access to high-speed internet were broadly disadvantaged.

Under the FCC’s program, it’s looking to deploy high-speed broadband to over 5.2 million unserved homes and businesses across the US and has thus awarded $9.2 billion in subsidies that’ll be doled out in a ten-year period to 180 companies that’ll handle the deployment. 

From the $9.2 billion, SpaceX individually pulled in one of the biggest hauls with $885 million, along with other companies like Charter Communications ($1.22 billion), CenturyLink ($262 million), and LTD Broadband ($1.32 billion).

The FCC estimates that the freshly doled-out $9.2 billion in subsidies will expand high-speed broadband to over 10 million rural Americans. The program was overseen by the FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, who recently announced that he’ll depart the commission next year in anticipation of an administration change.

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