Elon Musk, chief executive officer of SpaceX and Tesla, arrives to launch SpaceX’s Starlink internet service in Indonesia at a sub district community health center in Denpasar, Bali, May 19, 2024.
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

Elon Musk traveled to Indonesia’s resort island of Bali on Sunday to launch Starlink satellite internet service in the world’s largest archipelago nation.

Wearing a green Batik shirt, Mr. Musk was greeted with a garland of flower petals at a community health clinic in Denpasar, the provincial capital of Bali, where he launched the Starlink service alongside Indonesian ministers.

Indonesia, a vast archipelago of 17,000 islands sprawled across three time zones with a population of more than 270 million, has been trying for years to secure deals with Mr. Musk’s Tesla on battery investment and for Mr. Musk’s SpaceX to provide fast internet for the country’s remote regions.

During the ceremony, Mr. Musk took a speed test of the Starlink internet service with several health workers in Indonesia’s remote regions, including in Aru, one of Indonesia’s unserved and outermost islands in Maluku province.

“This can make it really a lifesaver for remote medical clinics, and I think it could be a possibility for education as well,” Mr. Musk told reporters.

“If you can access the internet and then you can learn anything and you can also sell your business services worldwide. So, I think it’s going to be incredibly beneficial,” he said.

He also signed an agreement on enhancing connectivity in the country’s health and education sectors. Details about the agreement between the Indonesian government and Mr. Musk’s SpaceX, the aerospace company that operates Starlink services, were not provided.

Launching the service at a health clinic aligns with Starlink’s broader mission of providing affordable access to high-speed internet services, particularly in underserved and remote regions, said Coordinating Minister of Maritime and Investment Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan.

“Our remote regions need Starlink to expand high-speed internet services, especially to help with problems in the health, education and maritime sectors,” Mr. Pandjaitan, a close ally of Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo, told reporters. He held separate talks with Mr. Musk on Sunday.

Communication and Informatics Minister Budi Arie Setiadi said earlier that local internet providers, which rely on base transceiver stations to transmit signals, are unable to reach outer islands because they have limited coverage. Starlink’s satellites, which remain in low orbit, will help them deliver faster internet with nationwide coverage.

Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin said of the more than 10,000 clinics across the country, there are still around 2,700 without internet access.

“The internet can open up better access to health services as communication between regions is said to be easier, so that reporting from health service facilities can be done in real time or up to date,” he said.

During his first in-person visit to Bali, Mr. Musk is also scheduled to participate in the 10th World Water Forum, which seeks to address global water and sanitation challenges.

Mr. Musk spoke in 2022 at the B-20 business forum ahead of a summit of the Group of 20 leading economies that took place in Bali. He joined the conference by video link weeks after completing his heavily scrutinized takeover of Twitter.

Mr. Musk’s visit comes just weeks after Apple CEO Tim Cook met Widodo on April 17 and said the company would “look at” manufacturing in Indonesia. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella visited on April 30 and said the company would invest $1.7 billion over the next four years in new cloud and artificial intelligence infrastructure in Indonesia.

Indonesia under Widodo has promoted development of the digital technology and information sectors, aiming to achieve the government’s Golden Indonesia 2045 Vision. The country hopes to become one of the world’s top five economies with a GDP of up to $9 trillion, exactly a century after it won independence from Dutch colonizers.

Days after Tesla Inc.’s largest-ever round of layoffs and hours before its quarterly earnings, Elon Musk will fly to India to squeeze in a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It’s not an idle period for PM Modi either, who’s criss-crossing states for election rallies days after voting kicked off in the world’s biggest election where he’s seeking a third term.

The tight timing of their meeting early next week underscores the high stakes for both men. For Musk, the prize is India’s permission for SpaceX’s Starlink Inc. to operate in what will be by far its biggest market, given China’s resistance to the American company.

For PM Modi, the appearance of Tesla cars in the streets of Delhi and Mumbai – and a potential investment in manufacturing by the carmaker – will cast him as a leader who’s brought marquee foreign investment to India, modernized its cities into global metropolises, and created jobs.

“It’s symbolic of the growing foreign investor interest in India,” said Sonal Varma, chief economist for India and Asia ex-Japan at Nomura Holdings Inc. This is “not just due to supply chain diversification from China for export purposes, but also to take advantage of India’s burgeoning domestic demand.”

The trip is likely to yield breakthroughs on both matters. 

Starlink has already received assurances from the government that it will be able to start operating in the country as soon as the third quarter of this year, according to people familiar with the matter who did not want to be identified as the information is not public yet.

This will end a years-long impasse with the Modi administration and help Starlink close in on two homegrown rivals that secured India licenses for satellite-based internet services last year.

India’s Ministry of Communications didn’t respond to an email seeking comment. Starlink did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A sizable investment by Tesla, on the other hand, will allow Musk to tap India’s booming electric vehicle market and counter slowing demand for EVs elsewhere – a positive spin for the carmaker when Musk speaks on the crucial earnings call Tuesday. Tesla watchers, however, will want to see action on the ground after witnessing delays in previously announced projects such as the massive Mexico plant.

Tesla has been trying to break into India for years but high import taxes were a deterrent, something Musk has pointed out repeatedly. India last month lowered import taxes on EVs from foreign carmakers that pledge to invest at least 41.5 billion rupees ($497 million) and start EV production from a local factory within three years.

Frosty China

While Starlink’s services are available in the US, much of Europe and Asian countries such as Japan, Malaysia and the Philippines, India and China haven’t approved it.

Despite Tesla being a big investor in China and Musk meeting top officials in Beijing and Shanghai during a visit last May and June, the Chinese government has called the SpaceX service an arm of the Pentagon.

That’s why winning over India – the only other giant market with a billion-plus population – is especially important for SpaceX.

Starlink operations would also mark a further deepening of the security partnership between India and the US, according to Alex Capri, a research fellow for the Singapore-based Hinrich Foundation. The two countries, along with Japan and Australia, are cooperating in the Quad, a Washington DC-led effort to counter China’s influence.

The US and India “are stepping up surveillance in the Indo-Pacific,” he said. “Starlink definitely has a role in that.”

Checkered Past

The firm, however, has had a checkered past with the Modi government.

In 2021, it suffered a setback when the Indian government asked Starlink to stop selling subscriptions to the public before it had even applied for a license. The administration also asked it to refund the subscription fees collected from customers.

Since then, Musk’s space business in India has been in limbo, stymied in part by a requirement that providers of telecom services have some local ownership. Musk has resisted similar rules in countries such as South Africa and Taiwan.

The first signs of a thaw came when Modi’s government introduced last year a bill that proposed to eliminate auctions for allocating spectrum to companies that offer satellite internet services. It was a favorable outcome for Starlink and OneWeb, which told the country’s telecom regulator they are against bidding for satellite airwaves.

Satellite broadband services are “also aligned to India’s digital focus” and could enable better delivery of government programs, Nomura’s Varma said.

Easing Rules

India in February eased foreign direct investment rules for the space sector allowing companies to invest in manufacturers of satellites and rockets without requiring government approvals.

Starlink will still need to resolve issues related to security approvals, spectrum allocation and pricing plans before it starts operating in India. Once it does, Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. and Sunil Mittal-backed OneWeb will have trouble competing, according to Gareth Owen, a UK-based associate director at Counterpoint Research. OneWeb is a subsidiary of Eutelsat Communications SACA.

The SpaceX unit has more than 5,600 active satellites in low-Earth orbit, with plans to launch tens of thousands more, as it aims to rival telecom providers that use larger and higher orbit satellites that hover over one location.

“Starlink has a major advantage,” Owen said. “It has the largest constellation of LEO satellites deployed in orbit, covering most of the regions, and offering connectivity services across the globe.”

New Delhi:

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk shared a stunning video captured by Starship of its reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere as it finished its first successful flight through space on Thursday – its third attempt.

The footage shared by Musk on X showed the “super hot plasma field grow” – a red hot flame enveloping the spacecraft – as Starship prepared to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere a little over 46 minutes into its flight.

Temperatures hit north of 2,600 degrees Fahrenheit as the craft made its re-entry.

Elon Musk captioned the video: “Watch the super hot plasma field grow as Starship re-enters the atmosphere!”

Watch the super hot plasma field grow as Starship re-enters the atmosphere! pic.twitter.com/to4UOF2Kpd

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 14, 2024

As the craft nears the Earth, loud cheers at the SpaceX headquarters almost overpowered the commentary.

But it all went south after this as radio communication with the Starship went blank. The spacecraft is lost, SpaceX announced later.

This is the first-of-its-kind re-entry footage as the previous ones were captured by the crew from inside the cabin.

It is extremely difficult to relay data home through such heated plasma fields. But Starship managed using SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites, SpaceX said.

“Reliable high-speed, low-latency internet around the world – even while traveling at 27,000 km/h through a plasma field,” Starlink wrote on X, sharing the video of Starship’s reentry.

The craft managed to send imagery till a little over 48 minutes after launch. It descended to an altitude of 77 km – the last footage showed.

Starship, the world’s most powerful rocket, flew further and faster than it ever did after taking off on Thursday – its third test flight. But it was eventually lost as it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere over the Indian Ocean, SpaceX said.