Why China fears Starlink
Elon Musk, to deny Taiwan access to Starlink. Mr Musk’s other big firm, Tesla, has a large factory in Shanghai. Last year he suggested giving China some control over Taiwan in order to resolve their dispute.
(SpaceX lists Taiwan as a place where Starlink is “coming soon", but the firm has not applied to operate there on a commercial basis.) Unsurprisingly, Taiwan is looking to reduce its dependence on others. Its space agency is developing its own low-orbit communication satellites. The first is expected to be launched in 2025.
China’s low-orbit ambitions are much larger. In 2020 the government filed papers with the International Telecommunication Union, a UN body, for a 12,992-satellite constellation. A year later the government established China Satellite Networks Group Limited and tasked it with developing satellite internet.
At least seven state-owned and private Chinese companies are building satellite factories, with the expectation that they will soon be able to produce several hundred small communications satellites per year. Officials in Beijing have developed a space-race mentality. Specific orbits and radio frequencies are “rare strategic resources" that Starlink wants to “monopolise", warned the Liberation Army Daily in 2022.
Last year Wu Yansheng, the chairman of China’s main space contractor, said his country needed to move faster in becoming a “space power". In April the prime minister, Li Qiang, toured three startups in order to highlight the importance of their industries. One was Galaxy Space, a maker of satellites, six of which were launched into low orbit last year.
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