- + Toggle Dark Mode In what could have been an even more surprising twist than the ill-fated Apple Car, Apple once toyed with the idea of becoming a satellite internet service provider (ISP). Apple Apple reportedly spent around $36 million to test the concept at a secret facility in El Segundo, California. The goal was to launch the service in 2019, but in the end, it turned out to be too big a bite for even Apple. In addition to being extremely costly — one satellite provider told Apple it could cost up to $40 billion just to deliver the initial service — Apple CEO Tim Cook was reportedly also concerned about destroying Apple’s relationship with the telecom industry. Since it wouldn’t be feasible to switch to a satellite-delivered service overnight, Apple would still need to get along with the carriers during the transition, but none of them would be eager to work with a company that was effectively out to steal away a significant number of their customers. In 2018, Apple briefly considered scaling back the plan to deliver only home Internet, but the costs and lack of a near-term business plan that would see the company break even quickly put the kibosh on that. Instead, Apple scaled things down even further, refocusing on providing emergency satellite connectivity in remote areas. This project ultimately launched as Emergency SOS via Satellite for the iPhone 14 in 2022. Elon Musk’s Orbital Wars Somewhere along the way, Elon Musk also jumped into the fray, offering to provide the iPhone with connectivity through Starlink. While the specific timeline for this isn’t entirely clear from the report, it seems that Musk began sniffing around when he heard that Apple was planning its emergency connectivity features. Musk’s proposal was to provide exclusive satellite connectivity via his Starlink constellation for 18 months in exchange for an upfront payment of $5 billion, followed by $1 billion per year after that. He gave Cook 72 hours to decide, threatening to announce a competing satellite feature if Apple failed to agree to a deal. Apple rejected that and went with Globalstar instead, building out its satellite connectivity on the S-band and L-band. Making good on his threat, Musk announced a partnership between SpaceX and T-Mobile two weeks before the iPhone 14 launched. Musk also hasn’t recovered from being jilted by Cook. He’s considered making his own Tesla smartphone to compete with the iPhone and has backed up Epic Games in the fight against the App Store. Meanwhile, SpaceX has been fighting Globalstar at every turn, objecting to its plans to launch new satellites and its rights to the spectrum it uses for iPhone connectivity.