Ambani’s Reliance has argued that the telecom regulator incorrectly concluded that home satellite broadband spectrum should be allocated and not auctioned,
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance has argued that the telecom regulator incorrectly concluded that home satellite broadband spectrum should be allocated and not auctioned, a letter seen by Reuters shows, intensifying a face-off with Elon Musk’s Starlink. The methodology of giving out spectrum for satellite services in India – a market set to grow 36% a year to reach $1.9 billion by 2030 according to Deloitte – has been a contentious issue since last year.

Musk’s Starlink and global peers like Amazon’s Project Kuiper back an administrative allocation, while Ambani – Asia’s wealthiest man who runs India’s Reliance Jio – is arguing for an auction process.

The current dispute is over an interpretation of Indian law that some in the industry say paved the way for the allocation of spectrum last year as Musk wanted.

But Reliance is arguing no provisions are in place for satellite broadband services for individual or home users, industry sources said on Sunday.

The telecom regulator, TRAI, is holding a public consultation, but Reliance in a private Oct. 10 letter seen by Reuters asked for the process to be started afresh as the watchdog has “pre-emptively interpreted” that allocation is the way forward.

“TRAI seems to have concluded, without any basis, that spectrum assignment should be administrative,” Reliance’s senior regulatory affairs official Kapoor Singh Guliani wrote in the letter to India’s telecoms minister Jyotiraditya Scindia.

Level playing field

TRAI has in its consultation paper indicated Indian laws mandate allocation of spectrum for such services without conducting any studies, Reliance added in its letter.

“We have requested (the) TRAI to amend the consultation paper” to ensure a level playing field, Reliance Jio said in a statement to Reuters on Sunday, adding that “it is imperative upon TRAI to also consult on the methodology of assignment” of spectrum.

A senior TRAI official said on Sunday that due process is being followed and Reliance is welcome to share feedback during the consultation period.

The recommendations of the watchdog will form the basis for the government’s decision on the matter.

Tesla boss Musk is keen to launch Starlink in India, though a final decision on spectrum allocation remains a sticking point. Starlink argues that the administrative allotment of licences is in line with a global trend. Reliance says an auction is needed for a level playing field as foreign players could offer voice and data services and compete with traditional players, Reuters has reported.

Reliance’s Jio is India’s No. 1 telecoms player with 480 million users.

SpaceX has shared some dramatic close-up pictures of the 70-meter-tall Super Heavy booster at the start and finish of its historic test flight on Sunday, after which the rocket was brought safely back to Earth for the first time.

The photos show the Super Heavy’s Raptor engines lighted up during the launch at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas, as the vehicle launched on its fifth test flight, and also as it came in to land — secured by giant mechanical arms on the launchpad — about seven minutes after launch.

Launching and returning the world's most powerful rocket pic.twitter.com/E8AWRc5TTZ

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2024

Super Heavy, powered by Raptor pic.twitter.com/Eg7dO4M64t

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2024

SpaceX described the fifth test flight of the Starship — comprising the first-stage Super Heavy booster and the upper-stage Starship spacecraft — as its “most ambitious” to date “as we work to demonstrate techniques fundamental to Starship and Super Heavy’s fully and rapidly reusable design.”

Here’s a video of the remarkable moment when mechanical arms secured the enormous booster as it returned to Earth:

Thousands of distinct vehicle and pad criteria had to be met prior to catching the Super Heavy booster. Thanks to the tireless work of SpaceX engineers, we succeeded with catch on our first attempt. pic.twitter.com/6wa5v6xHI0

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2024

In a post on its website, SpaceX said: “Following a successful liftoff, ascent, stage separation, boostback burn, and coast, the Super Heavy booster performed its landing burn and was caught by the chopstick arms of the launch and catch tower at Starbase. Thousands of distinct vehicle and pad criteria had to be met prior to the catch attempt, and thanks to the tireless work of SpaceX engineers, we succeeded with catch on our first attempt.”

Earlier Starship test flights culminated in the booster either exploding in midair or being dumped in the sea.

While the booster got all the attention on Sunday due its astonishing homecoming, the Starship spacecraft enjoyed a successful flight, too, executing a hot-staging separation from the Super Heavy and igniting its six Raptor engines to carry it into orbit.

“It coasted along its planned trajectory to the other side of the planet before executing a controlled reentry, passing through the phases of peak heating and maximum aerodynamic pressure, before executing a flip, landing burn, and splashdown at its target area in the Indian Ocean,” SpaceX said, adding that the flight test concluded 1 hour and 5 minutes after launch when the spacecraft splashed down in the ocean.

“The entire SpaceX team should take pride in the engineering feat they just accomplished,” the Elon Musk-led spaceflight company said. “The world witnessed what the future will look like when Starship starts carrying crew and cargo to destinations on Earth, the moon, Mars, and beyond.”

In an earlier interview, Musk explained how SpaceX hoped to bring the Super Heavy booster home.

“This is a custom-built tower with arms that are designed to catch the largest flying and heaviest flying object ever made and pluck it outta the air,” the billionaire entrepreneur said. “So you got a couple hundred tons plummeting at more than half the speed of sound. So this thing is still coming in really fast. When the engines land … it’s gonna drop the velocity to basically zero and come in between the arms.”

“The arms will be wide, and as it’s coming in, the arms will close, go flush against the side of the vehicle, and the vehicle will be descending through the arms.”

Many observers thought that the first landing attempt would probably end in failure, so it was a very special moment as the booster settled in between the mechanical arms on the very first try.

On Thursday night, Tesla CEO Elon Musk set his sights on the future as his sleek, self-driving Cybercab drove through a staged city street at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, Calif. — but the flashy display wasn’t quite enough to truly woo investors.

The Cybercab, a robotaxi, is an autonomous, shiny, two-seater vehicle with double gull-wing doors and no steering wheel or pedals.

At Tesla’s invite-only “We, Robot” event, Musk estimated the consumer cost of a Tesla Cybercab would be about US$30,000 (C$41,250). The billionaire said the vehicle would “probably” be ready to purchase by 2027.

With the relatively low price tag, Musk said autonomous vehicles could be thought of as “individualized mass transit,” with a fuel cost of 20 U.S. cents a mile (12 U.S. cents a kilometre) over time.

The Cybercab’s charging will be inductive and does not require plugs, Musk advertised. (Inductive charging is wireless and uses electromagnetic induction to provide cordless electricity; for example, driving a car onto a charging station to fuel up.)

Despite Musk’s ambitious promises and the positive reaction of the event crowd, investors’ reaction was lukewarm.

Tesla shares fell six per cent before the bell on Friday. The stock, which has been pummelled in recent years — much to do with fears of rival electric vehicle brands eating into Tesla’s market share — has bumped up nearly 50 per cent since April, when Musk announced the shift to robotaxis.

Still, Tesla shares are down eight per cent over the last year, compared with a 33 per cent increase in the broad-market S&P 500 index.

Musk said the company has already produced 21 Cybercabs.

At Thursday’s big-budget event, he also unveiled Tesla’s new Robovan, a self-driving bus-like vehicle that can transport 20 people or a surplus of goods.

Musk imagined the Robovan being used to “solve for high density” transport, like ferrying an entire sports team.

He said the Robovan would also use inductive charging, but did not reveal when the vehicle would begin production, or how much one would cost.

“With autonomy, you get your time back,” Musk said.

He claimed his Cybercab would improve people’s lives by saving them time driving through traffic or looking for a parking spot.

“You can think of a car in the autonomous world being like a little lounge,” he said, adding that Tesla owners of the future could work, watch a movie or spend time on their phones, rather than drive attentively.

Beyond that, Musk boasted that self-driving cars would “save lives and prevent injuries.” He predicted autonomous vehicles would one day be 10 times safer than a human driver, but did not provide any additional information.

Musk did not specify where Tesla plans to produce its two new autonomous vehicle offerings.

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He did, however, predict launching unsupervised full self-driving (FSD) in California and Texas in the company’s Model 3 and Model Y electric vehicles by next year. As of now, Tesla only offers a “supervised” version of FSD, which requires a human driver at the ready to steer or brake behind the wheel.

“You could fall asleep and wake up at your destination,” Musk said of full self-driving.

It is unclear if Tesla has already applied for or obtained proper permits to operate autonomous cars on public roads.

Beyond vehicles, Musk appeared excited to show off the company’s humanoid robots. A line of the robots, called Optimus, entered the event space on their own in a single-file line.

In an attempt to prove Optimus is not just a “canned video,” Musk told the crowd the Optimus robots, which served drinks during the event, will “walk among you.” He asked audience members to “be nice” to the robots.

Musk said Optimus could in the future be “something spectacular; something that anybody could own.”

He predicted an Optimus would one day cost “probably US$20,000 to $30,000, long term” (about C$27,500 to $41,250).

Tesla advertised Optimus as an “autonomous assistant” and “humanoid friend.”

“I think this will be the biggest product ever, of any kind,” Musk bragged.

Time will tell if Musk and Tesla are able to deliver on the ambitious promises made during Thursday’s flashy product launch. The company has in the past repeatedly missed deadlines set by Musk, including a 2015 claim that Tesla’s vehicle fleet would reach “full autonomy” within three years. In 2024, this is still not the case.

The Cybercab will be forced to compete with other autonomous vehicles, including the Alphabet-owned Waymo and other Chinese manufacturers. By pursuing a lower-cost technological path for Tesla’s self-driving vehicles, Musk believes the company will be able to scale up far quicker than rivals.

Tesla’s strategy is simpler and much cheaper than that of its rivals but has critical weaknesses. Chief among those is that the AI technology underpinning its self-driving system makes it nearly impossible to pinpoint why a crash or other failure occurred — something that could concern regulators.

Tesla’s rivals use similar AI and camera technology, but layer on so-called redundant systems and more expensive sensors as a safety precaution.

Shares of ride-hailing firms Uber and Lyft were up about four per cent in premarket action, in a sign that Musk’s announcements were not seen as a threat to the companies.

— With files from Reuters

At a glitzy event held at Warner Bros. Studios Burbank in California, Tesla CEO Elon Musk unveiled the Cybercab: a robotic, self-driving taxi. Musk said that the vehicle, which has two seats, no steering wheel and no pedals, would be available before 2027. “I think it’s going to be a glorious future,” he told the crowd on 10 October.

Meanwhile, just a few kilometres south in Los Angeles, people are already being ferried about by autonomous vehicles operated by Waymo. It seems that the future is already here…