Eutelsat's shares tumble as Starlink competition mounts

By Gianluca Lo Nostro and Hugo Lhomedet

(Reuters) - Shares of French satellite service provider Eutelsat plunged on Friday after the company flagged lower cashflow from its geostationary equatorial orbit (GEO) satellites and forecast lower investments as competition from Elon Musk's Starlink mounts.

Shares of the Paris-based group fell 17% by 1255 GMT as the firm announced its half-year results.

The world's third-biggest satellite operator by revenue expects gross capex to come in between 500 million euros and 600 million euros ($524 million and $629 million) in 2025, down from its previous guidance of 700 and 800 million.

The decrease relates to "the timing of low Earth orbit (LEO) investments as well as increased vigilance on GEO capex," Eutelsat said.

The reported 535 million euro impairment on GEO satellites reflecting lower future cashflow and a weaker order book also contributed to Eutelsat's shares dropping, according to ING analyst Jan Frederik Slijkerman.

STARLINK CHALLENGES

Eutelsat runs 35 GEO satellites and has expanded its LEO network to up to 600 satellites after the acquisition of Britain's OneWeb in 2023.

Starlink, on the other hand, operates a network of more than 7,000 LEO satellites, which provide less latency than geostationary ones as they orbit closer to Earth.

"The reduction in investment ... is not enough to cope with the decline in activity on GEO satellites and the lack of LEO business," ODDO analyst Stephane Beyazian told Reuters.

The Space X unit leads in the business-to-consumer (B2C) segment but it is now targeting business-to-business (B2B), an area in which Eutelsat has historically led.

"We are a B2B player, but we do also see Starlink starting to come into the B2B segments as expected," CEO Eva Berneke said during a call with analysts.

Starlink recently signed deals with commercial airlines to provide in-flight connectivity.

Berneke added that Eutelsat has more than 1,000 aircraft in its backlog scheduled for installation, and she expects carriers to rely on both Starlink and OneWeb's capacities.

($1 = 0.9542 euros)

(Reporting by Gianluca Lo Nostro and Hugo Lhomedet in Gdansk; editing by David Evans)