AT&T is deciding what to do with its 70% stake in DirecTV, including a dividend recapitalization, bringing in a new investor, or selling its stake, Bloomberg reported, citing unnamed sources. AT&T declined comment. It spun off part of the business two years ago, with TPG Capital picking up 30% (see 2107160069). AT&T expects declining cash flow from DirecTV, Chief Financial Officer Pascal Desroches said at a Bank of America financial conference last month. “Those cash flows are much more resilient than many believe,” he said: “We're really happy with the way the business is being managed.”

Dish Network "has a long track record of safely flying a large satellite fleet and takes seriously its responsibilities as an FCC licensee," the company emailed us Monday in response to the FCC Enforcement Bureau's $150,000 fine over disposal of the company's EchoStar-7 satellite (see 2310020049). "As the Enforcement Bureau recognizes in the settlement, the EchoStar-7 satellite was an older spacecraft (launched in 2002) that had been explicitly exempted from the FCC’s rule requiring a minimum disposal orbit. Moreover, the Bureau made no specific findings that EchoStar-7 poses any orbital debris safety concerns," it said.

Dish Network will pay a $150,000 fine for improper disposal of its EchoStar-7 at the satellite's end of life, the FCC Enforcement Bureau ordered Monday. The bureau said Dish disposed of EchoStar-7 in 2022 at 122 km above its operational geostationary orbit instead of the 300 km specified in the debris mitigation plan in Dish's license. It said the satellite had less propellant than Dish estimated, resulting in the lower graveyard orbit. “As satellite operations become more prevalent and the space economy accelerates, we must be certain that operators comply with their commitments,” Enforcement Bureau Chief Loyaan Egal said: “This is a breakthrough settlement, making very clear the FCC has strong enforcement authority and capability to enforce its vitally important space debris rules.” Dish didn't comment.

Comments are due Dec. 26 on an FAA NPRM proposing that upper stages of commercial launch rockets be removed from orbit within 25 years after launch, said a notice in the Federal Register last week. The FAA proposal would cover anything larger than 5 mm. It's proposing a requirement that removal be within 30 days of the mission's completion if disposal is by controlled disposal or by a move to a disposal orbit or Earth-escape orbit; within five years if disposal is by retrieval; or within 25 years if using atmospheric uncontrolled disposal or natural decay.

The waiver requests in Lockheed Martin's pending application for a lunar surface and lunar orbit communications network (see 2303160002) run contrary to the shared and equitable frequency use needed for lunar operations, Astrolab told the FCC Space Bureau last week. "Rather than hastily granting broad spectrum rights to any one party ahead of broader government and international decisions," the FCC should follow spectrum management principles such as clear interference protections for shared use of lunar frequencies and neutral authorizations and sharing of spectrum among lunar systems and services, it said. Astrolab says it's developing a multipurpose rover to operate semi-autonomously on the moon, with its first commercial mission expected in 2026. It said it intends to seek FCC approval for the rover's radio system. It also urged FCC coordination of its approaches to Lockheed Martin and other commercial operations on the moon with other federal agencies' lunar activities and planning.

By 2035, someone might be killed or injured every other year by falling debris from SpaceX's Starlink satellites, the FAA said last week in a congressionally mandated study of the reentry risks posed by low earth orbit (LEO) megaconstellations. The FAA said that estimate comes from projections of Starlink's constellation growth size, and the 28,000 fragments expected to survive reentry each year. "If SpaceX is correct in reporting zero surviving debris ... the rise in reentry risk is minimal over the current risk," it said. The report focused on Starlink because of an Aerospace Corp. technical study indicating more than 85% of the expected risk to people on the ground and aviation in 2035 is projected to come from that particularly large constellation, the agency said. To have regulatory oversight of LEO reentry issues, the agency could pursue a rulemaking to amend its payload review process, the study said. But the FAA wouldn't go that route if the FCC or Commerce started regulating debris impacts from reentering satellite constellations, it said. The FAA said its regulatory reach is also limited since its authority doesn't cover payloads launched outside the U.S. by noncitizens or entities not organized in the U.S.

Eutelsat closed on its all-stock takeover of OneWeb, following Eutelsat shareholder approval, it said Friday. OneWeb will be a Eutelsat subsidiary, it said. Eutelsat said its geostationary constellation paired with OneWeb's low earth orbit constellation -- set to offer global coverage by year's end -- opens up various fixed and mobile connectivity markets and applications. "We can address a wider range of customer requirements and provide hybrid connectivity services where they are required worldwide," CEO Eva Berneke said. "The Eutelsat-OneWeb combination has given us the scale, financial strength, and business proposition to capitalise on the significant opportunity.” The deal is considered unlikely to face big regulatory headwinds in the U.S. (see 2207250041) and got FCC Space Bureau approval last month (see 2308040051).

Addressing orbital debris risks would involve all satellite operators sharing and regularly updating ephemerides, reasonable covariance, contact information and maneuverability status on Space-Track.org, SpaceX representatives told FCC Space Bureau staffers, said a docket 18-313 filing Thursday. SpaceX said operators also should share maneuvering capability on satellites operating near and above inhabited space stations. And it argued using an aggregate collision probability metric "would inject significant uncertainty and bias into the Commission’s orbital debris mitigation rules that would harm responsible, U.S.-licensed systems."

The FCC should set a 90-day deadline for the C-band relocation payment clearinghouse to process claims that come on or after Jan. 1, SES representatives told Wireless, Space, Public Safety and Homeland Security bureau and Office of General Counsel representatives, said a filing Thursday in docket 18-122. SES said the amount of reimbursement claims processing to be done by the clearinghouse is sizable. Of the 1,311 claims SES submitted, 103 have been processed. Of those 103, the average time to reimbursement has been 323 days, with some being paid after 680 days, it said. Given that backlog, it's premature to set final deadlines for the reimbursement process, SES said. The clearinghouse has been reviewing C-band claims "for years, and it should have the experience and resources to process claims efficiently," it said.

Satellite operator Skylo Technologies signed a partnership agreement with German telco O2 Telefonica for provision of hybrid satellite/terrestrial IoT coverage, Skylo said Wednesday. It said commercial launch of the hybrid connectivity will be in the coming months.