Two days after losing a satellite on the launch pad of ambition, AST SpaceMobile got the piece of paper it has chased for years: on April 21 the FCC granted commercial authority for the company to deliver direct-to-device cellular broadband from space across the United States, clearing a 248-satellite constellation and moving satellite-to-phone service from experiment to product. The same week, AT&T opened big-carrier earnings season with strong first quarter results built on bundled fiber and wireless, and Nokia closed out the vendor picture with its own first quarter report. Regulatory green lights, healthy carrier economics, and a recovering equipment market: the industry's spring is running warmer than its winter did.
A week that ended with a jolt. On Sunday morning, Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket delivered its reusable booster back to a landing ship but left AST SpaceMobile's BlueBird 7 satellite in an orbit too low to save, a costly setback for the company racing to build a direct-to-device constellation. Earlier in the week, Ericsson opened the network equipment earnings season with results that showed currency headwinds masking real underlying growth, and the FCC's Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau refreshed the Covered List, the government's roster of communications equipment deemed a national security risk. Space ambition, vendor economics, and security policy all in one week, which is roughly the modern telecom industry in miniature.
Year-end week delivered a victory lap, a rocket launch, and a regulator's scorecard. T-Mobile published its Un-carrier Unwrapped retrospective on December 22, claiming America's best network title, its strongest quarter in over a decade, and 90 million T-Life installs under new CEO Srini Gopalan. On December 23, AST SpaceMobile launched BlueBird 6 from India, a roughly 2,400 square foot phased array three times larger than its first-generation satellites and the largest commercial communications array ever sent to low Earth orbit. The same day, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr published a list of 75 wins delivered in 2025, confirming among them new frameworks allowing satellite operators to run direct-to-cell services at higher power levels.
The first week of November was a regulator's week with a satellite twist. On November 3 the FCC released its Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on broadband consumer labels, proposing to strip back parts of the labeling regime it finished building only a year earlier and opening a comment window through early December. On November 6 the Commission released its 2025 order on incarcerated people's communications services, revising rate caps and compliance deadlines under the Martha Wright-Reed Act. And on November 7, Vodafone and AST SpaceMobile announced plans for a new European satellite constellation for direct-to-device service, selecting Germany as the site of a sovereign European satellite operations centre for their SatCo joint venture.
The week Verizon hit reset. On October 6 the company abruptly named former PayPal chief Dan Schulman as CEO, replacing Hans Vestberg effective immediately, a board-driven change aimed at reversing subscriber losses at the largest US carrier by revenue. Two days later, AST SpaceMobile announced a definitive commercial agreement with Verizon to deliver space-based cellular service to Verizon customers starting in 2026, using Verizon's 850 MHz spectrum. All of it played out against a federal government shutdown that began October 1 and closed most of the FCC, furloughing the bulk of its staff and freezing filings, databases, and routine approvals across the industry.
A week of endings and arguments. AOL announced it will shut down its dial-up internet service on September 30 after more than three decades, closing the era that introduced America to the online world. On August 12 NTIA released two MITRE-commissioned reports arguing that smarter receivers, not just more spectrum, are key to squeezing more capacity out of crowded airwaves. And AST SpaceMobile's S-band spectrum acquisition drew analyst fire, with one prominent assessment calling the ITU priority rights largely worthless and igniting a debate over what orbital spectrum positions are really worth.
Space, supply chains, and steady growth defined the week. On August 5 AST SpaceMobile agreed to acquire global S-band spectrum priority rights held under the International Telecommunication Union, deepening its direct-to-device arsenal. On August 6 Apple announced an additional 100 billion dollars in US manufacturing investment, bringing its domestic commitment to 600 billion over four years as tariff pressure reshapes device supply chains. And on August 7 Deutsche Telekom raised its full-year guidance again on the strength of T-Mobile US, underscoring how thoroughly the American market drives the German group's results.
The satellite race answered back, and the spectrum pipeline formally opened. Verizon completed its first satellite-to-cellular video call using AST SpaceMobile's BlueBird satellites on February 24, a direct riposte to T-Mobile's Starlink Super Bowl moment and proof the AST camp can do more than text. At its February 27 meeting the FCC adopted the upper C-band Notice of Inquiry and AWS-3 auction procedures, converting agenda promises into live proceedings and starting the clock on the next mid-band supply wave. And EchoStar closed the books on a difficult 2024, reporting Boost Mobile subscriber progress amid shrinking revenue and the debt overhang that would define its dramatic year ahead.
The year opened with a spectrum coup, a customer promise, and the annual Las Vegas hardware pilgrimage. AST SpaceMobile started 2025 by securing long-term access to up to 45 megahertz of premium L-band spectrum through a deal with bankrupt Ligado Networks, paying 550 million dollars to give its satellite constellation something no direct-to-device rival owns: dedicated licensed spectrum of its own. AT&T launched the AT&T Guarantee, promising automatic bill credits for network outages across wireless and fiber, a first among the majors and a direct response to its damaging 2024 outage. And CES 2025 wrapped in Las Vegas with AI stitched into everything, from Nvidia's consumer superchips to connected cars, all of it presuming ubiquitous connectivity someone has to sell.