A Starlink satellite passes overhead. Elon Musk's SpaceX has now launched close to 12,000. Photo / Getty Images
A Starlink satellite passes overhead. Elon Musk's SpaceX has now launched close to 12,000. Photo / Getty Images
The telco industry’s worst-kept secret is out: Starlink is Spark’s partner for its new satellite-to-mobile service, launching today.
Like the Starlink satellite-to-mobile service launched by One NZ in December 2024, it’s a mobile blackspot beater: It allows you to send or receive a text via satellite from anywhere in NewZealand or our territorial waters, using a stock-standard smartphone (or at least, a broad range of Apple and Samsung phones with more makes expected to be added).
Again like One NZ’s service, you can also use cut-down versions of several popular apps, including WhatsApp for voice or video calls, Facebook Messenger and Google Maps.
The new service is branded as Spark Satellite.
Like all satellite services, it will require a line of sight to the sky.
“Spark Satellite text and data services are now automatically included at no additional cost with Spark’s Consumer Pay Monthly and Prepaid mobile plans priced at $75 and above,” a Spark spokeswoman said.
Business mobile plans $72 and above, and selected Enterprise mobile plans were included too.
“Customers on all other mobile plans (excluding One Number and Kids Watch plans) can add Spark Satellite text and data as an optional extra from $10.”
One NZ offers its satellite-to-mobile service free with a range of plans, including its $40/month Lite Plan, which includes text-only satellite, and its $85 One Plan, which includes satellite text and data.
It charges $5 per month for satellite text and $20 per month for satellite data for others.
A photo taken in orbit of part of an AST SpaceMobile satellite's 223sq m phased array.
Where 2degrees is at
2degrees is lining up a satellite-to-mobile service for launch later this year, with budding Starlink rival AST SpaceMobile, whose financial backers – many also anchor customers – include Google, AT&T, Samsung and Vodafone.
While Starlink has thousands of satellites, AST SpaceMobile’s model involves a handful of supersize satellites with arrays that unfurl to 223sq m, or roughly the size of a tennis court. Its launch programme is underway.
Where Starlink and Amazon Leo have a model that relies on a swarm of thousands of satellites, AST SpaceMobile uses a handful of giant birds - each with a phased array the size of a tennis court.
2degrees is also building a ground station Marton in the Manawatū, where AST SpaceMobile will install equipment.
(With its Vocus NZ merger, 2degrees absorbed Vocus’s various network and telco infrastructure work, including its ground stations for Starlink in NZ and, now, AST).
“The ground station build is going really well,” A 2degrees spokesman told the Herald this morning.
The pads for the antennas were poured this week.
“The antennas are in a warehouse in Auckland, and will be shipped to Marton and installed soon.”
More satellite competition on the way
Then there’s Amazon’s US$10 billion Amazon Leo network (formerly known as Project Kuiper, which has a similar mass-satellite model to Starlink.
In late 2025, Amazon Leo won a contract with Australia’s National Broadband Network (NBN) to supply internet-from-above to 300,000 remote homes, with service beginning later this year.
The Jeff Bezos-founded company says the Amazon Leo service will be expanded to New Zealand. No timeline has been announced, but Overseas Investment Office approval was granted to buy land for a ground station. The Herald understands construction has begun..
Starlink is a subsidiary of Elon Musk's SpaceX. Photo / Getty Images
Starlink lines up IPO
Starlink is fully owned by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which has just filed for a monster initial public offering, scheduled for July. SpaceX, which has a private equity valuation of US$1.2 trillion, is aiming to raise between US$40 billion and US$85b with its stock market listing, which would make it one of the largest IPOs ever.
Musk’s firm has launched more than 12,000 satellites. Only about 650 are larger “second-generation” models that support satellite-to-mobile data, but the number increases each week.
Outside of its deals with mobile network operators, Starlink sells a home, small business and boat/campervan satellite dish-based broadband service.
Spark, One NZ and 2degrees are all resellers of the business-grade version of Starlink’s dish-based service.
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.
