SpaceX on Friday challenged the U.S. Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) decision to deny the space company's satellite internet unit $885.5 million in rural broadband subsidies, calling the move "flawed" and "grossly unfair," in a regulatory filing.
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The FCC in last month turned down applications from billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX and LTD Broadband for funds that had been tentatively awarded in 2020 under the commission's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, a multibillion-dollar program in which SpaceX was poised to receive $885.5 million to beam satellite internet to U.S. regions with little to no internet connections.
"The decision appears to have been rendered in service to a clear bias towards fiber, rather than a merits-based decision to actually connect unserved Americans," SpaceX's senior director of satellite policy, David Goldman, wrote in a scathing appeal filed Friday evening.
The FCC declined to comment.