It’s been making the headlines recently but I’ll be completely honest, this one was completely off my radar but having started digging and reading up on the company and what it’s actually up to, it is well and truly ON my radar.
This week I’ll be really deep diving into the numbers and where I feel it may go and I will post another item on this when it’s done so please feel free to sign up for newsletters! (This is a free blog, nothing to buy and it’s very much in its infancy but there will be loads of exciting things coming!
There’s certainly a lot of retail investors dipping in and out of this at the moment and I can see the lure, it’s had pretty big gains but what got my attention wasn’t the fact that it popped up as being a big gainer but it was a comment from someone about the launch of a satellite in September.
Digging around a little I found the news of the launch of a satellite planned for next month and how their service would enable any mobile phone to connect (where as up until now, satellite mobiles are a whole different kettle of fish). This is where I really got interested because I live in a rural area and blotchy mobile signal is a pain in the behind for me and has been for a long time, even now I’m on 5g I am teased with one bar when at home, almost like the network is saying to me “look what you could have if you hadn’t insisted on nature and fresh air!”.
So the idea of perhaps being able to sign up for a service that came from space, especially lower orbit space which will have far less latency than the traditional satellite systems really sparked my interest. But my knee jerk reaction was that from an investment point of view this could be like a pharmaceutical company who gets so far in stage one of a clinical trial, stocks soar and then in phase two they kill all the volunteers. So the glittering headlines of a Satellite being launched in September left me very interested but not holding out too much hope.
That was until yesterday when I finally got round to actually reading their investor presentation and on the face of that, this really does look impressive. For starters, it looks like they have already done launches and test runs. They have made 2g , 3g and now 5g calls and all in a very short space of time, suddenly I feel a lot less sceptical about the upcoming launches of satellites. Of course rocket launches carry enourmous risks of them going wrong and it’s not something I know much about but as a society the reality is that we are sending satellites into orbit at a faster rate than ever. You only have to look at Elon Musk who, from what I understand has thousands of the things zooming around up there for his satellite internet service.
But it’s one thing having an idea, it’s another testing it and finding it works but then you still have that little problem of actually making money. But it looks like the clever people at AST are well and truly onto it. There are some bit names backing them and there are already talks and promising developments with major mobile networks, and of course, why wouldn’t there be? If you’re the CEO of a mobile phone network and you could do a deal with a company that can cover your customers when there is no traditional signal, you’re automatically going to have the best and most reliable mobile network and that in turn will mean your business is going to skyrocket (for want of a better way of putting it). Depending on costs it could maybe even mean mobile networks can cut their spending on infrastructure in areas of low use and just outsource it to a system like this.
And that got me thinking even more, 5G mobiles with no black spots. Image the potential here. Mission critical services such as the emergency service, military, businesses, tracking services, the list goes on. The potential for these guys really is enormous. For those of us who’ve spent any time at sea, you’ll be familiar with patchy and very expensive satellite internet and call charges. We haven’t talked about cost yet, but if they can compete on cost and service it could be revolutionary.
Ok I know I’m getting carried away, they’ve got to launch these things, pray it all works, test it in all conditions and they’re bound to hit some bumps in the road, each one giving others a chance to jump in but this company is the type of company that I refer to when I talk about investing in businesses that you believe in long term.
As I said, I’m going to deep dive a little into this, look at the numbers and business model. They certainly have some strong management and backing but for me, it’s important to know a little more about the money, if of course they have enough data for predictions and they are public. So please subscribe on the newsletter page to be updated when I write more.
In the meantime I have opened a fairly small position in this and if things stack up it could well be one that I seriously consider taking a more important place in my portfolio for the long term. It’s early days but this one is giving me that warm fuzzy feeling so far!
