Another investment bank has upgraded its views on AST SpaceMobile – which is planning a global direct-to-cellular satellite broadband service.

Roth Capital Partners, headquartered in Newport Beach, California, has raised its share price target for AST to $51 (from $42) and citing the 89 per cent rise in AST’s share price since April. Roth rates AST a ‘BUY’ and also cited the 1.8 million registrations for T-Mobile’s Starlink service as an indicator to likely demand. Roth says that despite Starlink’s inferior offering (Starlink text vs AST’s voice, text and broadband) and T-Mobile’s $10 fee, the bank suggests that the take up is “extremely positive” for AST’s penetration and pricing.

An update from the Bank of America Securities on July 7th also saw AST mentioned as one of the bank’s ‘Transforming World’ stocks.

The overall optimism is probably well-founded, but first AST has to get its satellite system launched and working. For this it needs at least 25 (and ideally 45-60) satellites in orbit for an initial service.

Currently, launch dates are slipping and it is thought that India’s ISRO planned launch could slip to August, or even later. SpaceX is contracted to launch AST satellites at about the same time.

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Categories: Blogs, Broadband, Inside Satellite, Satellite

Tags: AST SpaceMobile, bank, spacex