partners with a mobile operator to provide internet connection

The soap opera experienced in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine regarding Starlink and Elon Musk is still very present in Spain. The satellite service, which had become the cornerstone of Ukraine’s communications, became the magnate’s biggest problem, who limited its use for military purposes numerous times. After a series of tensions with Zelensky’s side, Musk has reached an agreement with Kyivstar PJSC, Ukraine’s main mobile operator, to bring mobile internet service to the country.

This is how he tells it Bloomberg, which exposes this agreement that Kyivstar and Elon Musk have reached to be able to carry the recent satellite connection service for mobile phones to Ukraine. All this without having to suffer the constant problems involved in bringing the standard Starlink service to Ukrainian combat territory, which caused the Russians to end up acquiring SpaceX terminals. Of course, Elon Musk and the Pentagon took matters into their own hands.

The idea on paper is simple. Kyivstar users will be able to use satellite connectivity when the Ukrainian terrestrial network cannot provide service in certain areas due to constant Russian attacks on Ukraine’s telecommunications infrastructure. The service will offer connectivity for text messages by the end of 2025, and in future stages Voice messages and satellite data connection can be supported.

A new agreement with Ukraine

Kyivstar PJSC is a Ukrainian subsidiary within the Veon firm, which is its parent company. The company is one of the main drivers of future plans to restore Ukraine’s ailing digital infrastructure. Therefore, the agreement between Kyvistar and SpaceX, responsible for Starlink, is not strange in the face of this reconstruction.

The objective of the mobile operator is to use the new mobile connection service with satellites that SpaceX has begun to design using their Starlink satellites. At the beginning of the year they launched the first satellites specifically designed for this purpose, and in December the first operators began to join together to carry out the first free tests that would serve as a starting signal for the service. The first was T-Mobile in the United States and then One NZ followed in New Zealand.

Just like Veon explained in his statementKyivstar will join the rest of the operators to be one of the pioneers in using this new SpaceX mobile satellite connectivity service. The operator plans to launch these Starlink services for mobile phones first with messaging and SMS functionalities in the fourth quarter of 2025, and it won’t be until “later stages” that they will expand this support to “voice and data.”

The direct benefits of this agreement are obvious. One of the greatest challenges that the civilian population faces in the conflict is the lack of communications in the face of Russian attacks; Hence, Starlink is basically essential both in the military aspect and in the country’s civilian communities. Kyivstar users will be able to connect with this satellite connection “even when the terrestrial network cannot serve” the affected areas.

SpaceX also gains enormously from this decision. Elon Musk has made no secret of his direct rejection of Starlink being used primarily as a communications element in military conflicts. The Ukrainian armed forces have denounced on numerous occasions how Musk and SpaceX have hindered the use of Starlink in Ukraine, making their communications between units extremely difficult.

In June, the United States Pentagon and SpaceX extended their contract to continue providing Starlink terminals to Ukraine for six more months, and it was later learned that Putin was directly interfering with the service with numerous attacks. As if that were not enough, successive investigations revealed that an extensive black market allowed the Russians to obtain Starlink terminals for use in the line of combat with Ukrainian territory.