SpaceX is in talks with U.S. tower owners for access to at least 80,000 cell sites, Bloomberg reported on Oct. 22, citing people familiar with the matter. The sites would support a ground network for Starlink Mobile, which could make SpaceX a fourth nationwide wireless carrier alongside AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile. Nothing has been signed, and SpaceX has not commented.
For the telematics industry, the question is less about phones than about the millions of trackers, ELDs, dash cams and equipment gateways that depend on cellular coverage to report location and machine data.
What was reported
Crown Castle, which owns about 40,000 U.S. towers, was named in the talks. American Tower and Vertical Bridge, the other large tower owners, were also mentioned in coverage of the report. Crown Castle's chief executive declined to name customers on an earnings call but said the company is talking with "all parties."
The scale is large. The 80,000 figure is about half of the 158,500 purpose-built U.S. towers counted by the Wireless Infrastructure Association, and roughly in line with the number of cell sites each of the big three carriers runs. Crown Castle shares rose about 12% after the report, while shares of AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile fell.
Bernstein analyst Laurent Yoon said committing to 80,000 macro sites "could be a point of no return," and called the number broadly consistent with a nationwide terrestrial network. He also said it is uncertain whether SpaceX will lease anything near that figure. TD Cowen has estimated a nationwide ground network would cost more than $80 billion and take many years to build.
The pieces SpaceX already has
SpaceX has spent the past year assembling spectrum. The Federal Communications Commission approved its purchase of EchoStar's AWS-4, AWS-3 and H-block licenses in May. On Oct. 8, SpaceX agreed to buy up to 14 MHz of paired 800 MHz low-band spectrum, a deal expected to close in the first half of 2027 pending approval. The company said on its earnings call that the low-band spectrum is meant to provide signal inside buildings. Regulators also approved its purchase of three additional AWS-3 licenses on Oct. 21, and the FCC approved 15,000 next-generation direct-to-cell satellites on Oct. 7.
Skepticism from the tower industry
Not everyone is convinced. Ken Schmidt, a wireless infrastructure consultant, said in a LinkedIn post that he and Nick Del Deo of MoffettNathanson had held a webinar on Starlink Mobile hours before the report, and that both expected any SpaceX ground network to need far fewer sites than the big three. He questioned why SpaceX would need 80,000 sites if its direct-to-device satellites can serve phones outdoors, given the capital, operating costs and subscribers that would require. Schmidt suggested the talks could also be a way to pressure a major carrier into a wholesale (MVNO) agreement.
What it could mean for tracker coverage
Most fleet trackers and telematics devices connect through IoT SIMs on one or more of the three national carriers, using LTE Cat-1, LTE-M or NB-IoT. Coverage gaps on rural highways, farms, remote jobsites and inside yards, parking structures and containers are a long-running cause of late or missing pings. Satellite backup exists, but it usually means separate hardware or a separate plan.
A SpaceX network that combines towers and satellites under one operator could change that in a few ways:
- Another roaming partner. Multi-network IoT SIMs could add a fourth domestic network to switch to when a primary carrier is weak.
- One provider from tower to satellite. A device could move between ground and satellite coverage without a second subscription, if SpaceX supports IoT traffic on both.
- Better in-building signal. Low-band 800 MHz spectrum travels farther and penetrates walls better than mid-band, which matters for assets parked indoors or in metal containers.
- Pricing pressure. A new national network could push carriers and IoT connectivity resellers to sharpen data plan pricing.
There are important caveats. SpaceX has not announced IoT plans for a ground network, and any network is years away. Existing devices would only work on it if their cellular modules support SpaceX's bands, which many current modules may not. And if the talks are leverage for a carrier deal rather than a real build, the practical effect for trackers could be limited to what Starlink's satellites already offer.
What fleets and vendors can do now
Nothing needs to change today. When buying new hardware, fleets can ask which bands a device's module supports and whether its firmware can be updated for new networks. Telematics providers and IoT connectivity resellers will be the first to know whether SpaceX opens its network to machine traffic, and it is worth asking them about their plans.
