Opinion certainty 4/5 debate potential 3/5

LEO satellite communications startups are a terrible fit for venture capital

Jeremy Conrad · 20VC: Why Core AI Is Largely A Bunch of Nifty Tricks, Why Consumer Electronics Is The Hardest Thing To Do In Venture & Why Silicon Valley Will Dominate The Future of Robotics with Jeremy Conrad, Partner @ Lemnos Labs · Sep 20, 2017 · at 18:28

Jeremy Conrad is a partner at Lemnos Labs. He discusses why regulatory and capital requirements for spectrum make satellite communications startups risky venture bets.

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“There are groups trying to do this with these LEO constellations, but the first thing they do is spend hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars on spectrum, and that's not a good fit for the startup ecosystem.”

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