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Starlink gets contract with US Air Force for Europe and Africa airlift operations 

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The US Air Force will work with SpaceX’s Starlink to support airlift operations in Europe and Africa. 

On July 22, the US Air force awarded Starlink a $1.92 million contract. Starlink will provide 12 months of service from August 1, 2022 to July 31, 2023. The United States Armed Forces air service branch expects Starlink to provide throughput capabilities of up to 500 Mbps download speed and low latency connectivity. 

Starlink’s Contract with the US Air Force

Based on unclassified documents from the US Air Force, Starlink will provide fixed-site and portable services. 

For fixed-site services, internet connection will be assigned to an individual 22-km diameter Starlink cell. The connection should only work within the boundaries of the assigned cell. 

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Starlink’s portable services will be used where SpaceX currently has active coverage. The US Air Force plans to use Starlink services to support comms-on-the-move once SpaceX gets its ESIM license for its portable terminals. 

Why the US Air Force chose Starlink

In the publicly released documents, the US Air Force states that Starlink is the only Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite network that provides services to Europe and Africa. It also specifically highlights Starlink’s ability to deliver portable services to EUCOM and AFRICOM areas of responsibility. 

The US Air Force acknowledged that other companies are competing to establish LEO, Medium Earth Orbit (MEO), and Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO) satellite networks. However, it reasoned that Starlink is the most “well-established” LEO satellite network with more than 1,350 satellites, compared to competitors who are still in their “infancy.” It also pointed out Starlink’s support in the war between Ukraine and Russia as proof of its metal. 

“None of the current LEO internet providers (Amazon Kuiper, OneWeb, Telesat) aside from Starlink is currently capable of providing any service in both Europe and Africa. Starlink is also the only LEO satellite network provider that is currently being used in a contested environment: Ukraine,” noted the US Air Force.

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“With Ukraine’s operations emergent communication requirement, the communication requirements within and around eastern European areas in support of Ukraine operations expands daily. The time between the calling out of enduring solutions does not fit the required timelines for two of the requiring activities. 

“Starlink LEO fulfills the requirement of reducing processing times and increases theater based operations on changing requirements and locations. It also builds in circuit resiliency through Software Defined Wide Area networking (SDWAN) for one of the units allowing for multiple transport sources. After extensive research it was found that SpaceX-Starlink is the only vendor able to provide this specialized communication service in the current areas of operation in the required time,” it added.

Starlink gets contract with US Air Force after proving its metal in Ukraine by Maria Merano on Scribd

If you can provide any information about Starlink in Ukraine, contact me at maria@teslarati.com or via Twitter @Writer_01001101.

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Maria--aka "M"-- is an experienced writer and book editor. She's written about several topics including health, tech, and politics. As a book editor, she's worked with authors who write Sci-Fi, Romance, and Dark Fantasy. M loves hearing from TESLARATI readers. If you have any tips or article ideas, contact her at maria@teslarati.com or via X, @Writer_01001101.

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Investor's Corner

Tesla gets its latest short from Michael Burry: ‘Happy it jumped back to this level’

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Credit: MarcoRP | X

Tesla short seller Michael Burry, the subject of the film “The Big Short,” where he was portrayed by Steve Carell, has revealed he has opened a new bet against the stock.

In a new update to his Substack newsletter in a post titled “Trading Post June 30, 2026,” Burry revealed a new set of bets against Tesla, Caterpillar, NVIDIA, Applied Materials Inc., and the iShares Semiconductor ETF.

In regard to Tesla, Burry wrote:

“And finally I shorted Tesla at 416.22. Happy it jumped back to this level.”

This means Burry likely opened his new short position after the company’s recent rally on Wall Street, which saw Tesla shares sink in mid-May, only to recover to well over the $400 mark. Currently, shares trade at around $427.

The company saw a big Tuesday as shares climbed considerably, over 10 percent. The size of the Tesla short was not provided, nor did Burry give any information on the position’s structure, the number of shares, dollar value, or whether options were used in the short.

The Tesla and SpaceX merger everyone is talking about is quietly building

Over the years, Burry has been one of the more vocal critics of Tesla, calling its share price “media inflated,” and saying it was “ridiculously overvalued” as recently as December.

The company has largely transitioned away from being known as an automotive company and instead is much more widely regarded as an AI play, mostly due to its Full Self-Driving efforts, Optimus robot development, and data collection related to both.

This has not pulled those skeptics away from being vocal about their distaste for how Tesla is valued, but there’s no denying that the company is a global force in many things, including sustainable energy, automotive, and AI.

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Investor's Corner

SpaceX gets initial stock coverage from Tesla’s biggest bull

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SpaceX Starship V3 flight 12
SpaceX Starship V3 flight 12 (Credit: SpaceX)

Wedbush Securities is initiating stock coverage on SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX), marking the first comments on the company since it went public several weeks ago. Wedbush and its analyst handling coverage, Dan Ives, are widely bullish on fellow Musk company Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA).

Ives wrote his first note initiating coverage of SpaceX shares on Wednesday with a $190 price target and an ‘Outperform’ rating. The firm believes the company is well positioned off of its IPO because of its wide array of projects, including AI compute power and infrastructure, connectivity projects, and launches.

“We view SpaceX as one of the most differentiated assets within the tech market with a strong footprint across its three core markets, with Starlink driving success with connectivity,” Ives wrote, “Starship launches leading to a demand flywheel and increasing deal flow for its Colossus clusters.”

Elon Musk called it Epic: The full story of SpaceX’s Starship Flight 12

Wedbush leans heavily on Starlink, which they say is the “profitability driver given the strength of its recurring revenue base of ~12 million subscribers as of June 5th.” Ives believes Starlink is still in the “early innings” of penetrating the global telecommunications and broadband market, as it only holds less than a 1 percent share. However, this number is sure to increase over time.

It also highlights the importance of Starship, which it says is an “essential layer” of SpaceX’s overall success. SpaceX developing and displaying the ability to reuse rockets is a major cost and reliability advantage “as it reduces the necessary hardware launch costs while generating a feedback loop for future flights to improve their launch flight rate without accelerating capex spend.”

Finally, SpaceX’s recent AI/Compute projects are also very elementary, Ives writes. It is worth mentioning Wedbush said its $190 price target is derived from a valuation forecast that sees the company yielding roughly $2.48 trillion of implied enterprise value.

There are also some factors that Wedbush did not take into account with its initial coverage. The firm wrote in the note:

“We note that there is optional value coming from Starship’s accelerating scale towards sub-$200/kg unit economics, orbital data centers, and enterprise AI monetization as these factors could drive meaningful upside but these face major hurdles, so we do not take that into account with our valuation.”

SpaceX shares are down just over 2 percent today, trading at around $167 at the time of publication.

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Tesla expands massive safety feature worldwide in latest update

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Credit: Tesla

Tesla has expanded the footprint of a massive safety feature worldwide with a recent Software Update labeled as 2026.20.6. The expansion of the “Blind Spot Warning While Parked” feature represents the more widespread availability of the feature, which aims to prevent “dooring.”

Dooring is when a driver or passenger opens a car door into the path of an oncoming road user, usually a cyclist or motorcyclist. It is among the most common types of cycling accidents, the League of American Bicyclists says.

For this reason, Tesla created a feature that warns occupants not to open the door because an object is approaching. The feature will sound a chime, and it will also delay the opening of the door to prevent an incident.

The release notes state (via Not a Tesla App):

“If you attempt to open a door while an approaching object is detected in your blind spot (for example, a bicyclist approaching from behind) a chime sounds, and your door will not open upon initial button press. Wait a short time and press the button a second time to override the warning.”

Tesla initially rolled out this feature back in 2024 with the Model 3 “Highland.” However, it remained with the Model 3 exclusively for over a year; that was until Tesla added it to the Cybertruck this past Spring.

Now, it is making its way to the new Model Y, 2021 and newer Model S, and 2021 or newer Model X.

The prevention of dooring incidents could eliminate many injuries to cyclists, especially in an urban setting. Dooring accounts for 10-20 percent of bike-related crashes in major cities, and over 17,000 dooring-related incidents were treated in the U.S. over the course of a decade. These usually involve fractures, contusions, and head trauma.

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