SpaceX appeared before Icasa on Wednesday for the first time, using hearings on satellite spectrum fees to press the regulator on the ownership rules keeping Starlink out of South Africa.

Ryan Goodnight, the company's senior director for market access and development, presented in a 30-minute slot on day one of hybrid hearings held on 19 and 20 August. SpaceX had been scheduled to present at Icasa's previous satellite hearings in February 2025 and did not appear.

Most of what SpaceX asked for is technical and would apply to every operator. It wants gateway earth station fees charged per licence rather than per station, wider Ku-band availability for the terminals fitted to aircraft and ships, confirmation that one blanket licence covers an entire fleet of terminals regardless of model, and a minimum 10-year licence term, arguing that long licences weigh heavily on where operators choose to site infrastructure.

Icasa's Riaan van der Colff pushed back on the flat-fee proposal and asked SpaceX to name administrations where it had worked, though he was more sympathetic on terminals. The pointed request came last: how the 30% historically disadvantaged equity requirement applies to the new licence categories. That is where it stalls.

The requirement sits in the Electronic Communications Act rather than in Icasa's regulations, and Icasa said in May it cannot give full effect to Solly Malatsi's December policy direction on equity equivalence without amending the Act. SpaceX has still not lodged a licence application.

TechCentral reported the hearings and Icasa's scepticism about whether a purely bandwidth-based fee would encourage efficient spectrum use. 2oceansvibe noted the draft amendments were gazetted on 15 May in Government Gazette 54677, and that this was formally a fees consultation rather than a Starlink licensing hearing. ITWeb reported SpaceX's absence from the February 2025 round, which is what makes this appearance notable.

Follow the sequence. Icasa cannot act without an amended Act. The Electronic Communications Amendment Bill closed for written submissions at 4 pm on Friday and, as introduced, says nothing about ownership or equity equivalence. SpaceX will not cede local equity.

That is a deadlock with no scheduled resolution, and no amount of regulatory tidying moves it.

What is worth watching instead is the fee and licensing framework itself, because it applies to Amazon Leo, Eutelsat OneWeb and everyone behind them, not just Starlink. SpaceX has said it would spend around R2-billion locally on gateways, points of presence, power and fibre, and partner with SA ISPs on installation and reseller work. That channel is the real commercial prize here, and it depends on legislation nobody has drafted.

You might also like our piece on Starlink Mobile in the DRC launching while SA waits, the Comsol 5G network going after the same rural gap without satellites, and the SA 5G coverage gap all of this is competing to fill.

Get more SA tech and business news and subscribe to The Open Letter.