SpaceX said Thursday that it was considering spinning off its Starlink satellite internet business and taking that business public. But the company’s satellite business is “the right kind of business that we can go ahead and take public,” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell told an audience at a private investor event put on in Miami by JPMorgan Chase & Co., according to Bloomberg, which first reported the news. The company’s Starlink internet business hinges on launching a network of thousands of small satellites, being built by SpaceX in Redmond, Wash. SpaceX has launched more than 240 satellites, but it will need about 1,440 to provide full global coverage. Shotwell was not conclusive on an initial public offering but said Starlink was an element that SpaceX was “likely to spin out and go public.” SpaceX told the Los Angeles Times on Thursday that it could take Starlink public within the next several years. This photo of the first 60 SpaceX Starlink satellites loaded into a Falcon rocket was tweeted out by Elon Musk.

Source: Los Angeles Times February 06, 2020 18:45 UTC