SpaceX lashed out at some critics of its planned second-generation constellation, complaining in an FCC International Bureau filing Thursday of "recurring hypocrisy" and "self-righteous banalities" by Viasat, OneWeb, Kuiper and Kepler. SpaceX detailed the competitors' objections it said were contrary to those companies' own practices.

The FCC will boost staffing of its International Bureau's Satellite Division by 38%, Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in docket 12-1 letters to two House Communications and Technology Subcommittee members dated March 30 and posted Thursday. She said she also is accelerating the agency's satellite regulatory review process. The letters to Doris Matsui, D-Calif., and Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., were in response to their joint March 14 letter encouraging Rosenworcel "to work with Congress to update the FCC’s rules and authorities to support new [satellite] entrants and to increase competition and consumer choice while protecting the operations and significant investments of existing operators." Matsui and Guthrie also urged sunsetting interference protections for earlier-round systems from later-round ones "after a reasonable time period" as a means of encouraging more efficient spectrum use while preventing "the creation of entrenched incumbents." The FCC "should also sunset more protections, especially those for outdated technologies, in order to encourage continuous innovation and spectrum efficiency," they said.

Investors put more than $15 billion into startup space companies in 2021, nearly doubling the $7.7 billion record set in 2020, BryceTech said Wednesday. Last year also had a record number of startup space deals -- 241, up 48% year over year -- and recipients -- 212, up 46%. Average deal size was $64 million, up 35%, it said. The availability of future private funding will depend on factors including interest rates, it said.

France's Council of State court revoked SpaceX's authorization to operate there in the 12 GHz band and another portion of the Ku band. In a ruling this week, it said the 2021 authorization by France's telecommunications regulator allowing SpaceX to use 10.95-12.70 GHz downlinks and 14-14.5 GHz uplinks for its fixed satellite service broadband, should have been preceded by a consultation with the public. It said such an authorization "is likely to have a significant impact on the market for the provision of broadband internet access and affect the interests of end users." SpaceX didn't comment Wednesday.

The U.S. Agency for International Development, joining with SpaceX, has delivered 5,000 Starlink terminals to the Ukrainian government, it said Tuesday.

Amazon signed contracts for up to 83 launches over five years with Arianespace, Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance to put up its Project Kuiper broadband constellation, it said Tuesday. The launches would be the majority of its planned 3,236-satellite constellation, it said. Amazon said it has contracts for 18 Ariane 6 rockets; 12 launches using Blue Origin's New Glenn, with options for up to 15 more; and 38 launches on ULA's Vulcan Centaur. The agreement is atop Project Kuiper’s existing deal to secure nine Atlas V vehicles from ULA, it said.

Three SpaceX satellites failed between late February and late March, losing maneuverability capabilities, the company told the FCC International Bureau last week. The Feb. 28 and March 2 events were due to suspected flight computer failures, it said, noting particular components were removed from future designs. It said the March 24 failure was identified as a possible power system failure and again particular components were removed from future designs.

Satellite operator opposition to opening the 12 GHz band to 5G use "has it backwards" when it looks at years-old studies about difficulties of sharing between non-geostationary orbit and higher-power terrestrial services because such sharing is easier now due to beamforming and horizon mulling advancements, Dish Network said in a docket 20-443 post Monday, calling those satcom operators "the Anti-5G group." The ability of SpaceX's NGSO service and direct broadcast satellite services to share the band "is bleak," since SpaceX's first-generation constellation will exceed equivalent power flux density limits, it said. DirecTV and Intelsat aren't even extensive users of 12 GHz, while OneWeb and Kepler want to use the spectrum but have no demonstrable need for it, it said. The operators and SES said multichannel video distribution and data service licensees like Dish still have yet to offer any proposal for coexistence, in an ex parte filing last month on meetings with aides to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Commissioners Nathan Simington and Geoffrey Starks. That "seems to imply that protection of incumbent services by 5G services is impossible to achieve," they said. They said MVDDS interests ignored almost all the incumbent licensees because any technical study that acknowledges them and accounts for the sharing rules of the band "would show a massive disruption to millions of Americans."

There's evidence of significant research and development by multiple nations of a broad range of destructive and nondestructive counterspace capabilities, but so far only nondestructive capabilities are being used in military operations, per Secure World Foundation's annual global counterspace capabilities report. Nations' growing reliance on space means bigger incentives for development and possible use of offensive counterspace capabilities, it said. It said the U.S. has done multiple tests of technologies for rendezvous and proximity operations on orbit, plus tracking, targeting and intercept technologies that could lead to a co-orbital anti-satellite capability. The U.S. doesn't have an acknowledged program to develop co-orbit anti-satellite capabilities, but it has the technological capability to develop one in a short time, the April report said. The U.S. has done R&D on ground-based high-energy lasers for counterspace. There's no evidence it has a space-based directed energy weapons capability, but the Missile Defense Agency is planning research into the feasibility of space-based DEWs as ballistic missile defense and those systems could be de facto anti-satellite systems, it said. The report also detailed known capabilities of Russia, China, India, Australia, France, Iran, Japan, North Korea, South Korea and the U.K.

Embratel turned down the FCC International Bureau's U.S. market access grant of its Star One C4 satellite. In a bureau authorization surrender Thursday, it said it "has not and will not commence operations pursuant to the grant" awarded earlier in the month.