SpaceX shares rise 3.3% after deal to acquire low-band spectrum from Grain Management
The 800 MHz spectrum, which Grain Management bought from T-Mobile earlier this year, still needs FCC approval before SpaceX can put it to use.
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SpaceX shares are up 3.3% after the company agreed to acquire a nationwide low-band spectrum portfolio from Grain Management, a private investment firm, according to Via Satellite. The deal covers up to 14 megahertz of paired spectrum in the 800 MHz band.
Via Satellite reported that the financial terms were not disclosed. Reuters separately put the value at approximately $8 billion. Grain Management had acquired the same spectrum block from T-Mobile in a deal announced in early 2025 and completed in August for $2.9 billion in cash plus additional spectrum licenses.
Low-band spectrum travels farther and penetrates buildings better than the mid- and high-band frequencies SpaceX already holds, according to a Reuters explainer carried by 93.3 The Drive, though it carries less data. SpaceX said the new spectrum will give Starlink Mobile a coverage layer that gets signal through walls and other obstacles, complementing its existing 2 GHz mid-band spectrum used for high-bandwidth capacity. The Grain transfer still requires FCC approval, and SpaceX has said it plans to separately apply to modify its satellite network authorization so it can use the 800 MHz band from orbit, according to Xenospectrum.
The purchase follows a run of regulatory decisions that had been building through the year rather than arriving all at once. The FCC conditionally authorized SpaceX's 15,000-satellite Gen2 direct-to-smartphone constellation on October 6, after approving a two-step transfer of 2 GHz and other EchoStar-origin spectrum to SpaceX in May. Musk has described the new deal as the last piece needed for direct-to-phone coverage, giving SpaceX a consumer telecom story that sits apart from its launch, AI and compute businesses, and apart from the separate questions around its financing. SpaceX is in talks with banks and investors, reportedly led by Apollo, to raise $40 billion to buy Nvidia chips, a deal that would dwarf other recent AI compute financings and that follows reports of delays to SpaceX's own data center plans. Friday's move extends a rally that has already taken the shares sharply higher off their August low, giving investors a concrete new catalyst rather than another sentiment-driven headline.