TAMPA, Fla. — Verizon is launching satellite-enabled emergency text and location services this fall for compatible Android smartphones in the United States at no extra cost for customers.
The telecoms giant announced a partnership Aug. 28 to deliver the service with Skylo, which has developed ground infrastructure enabling L-band geostationary satellites to reach devices using the latest standards-based chipsets.
Google’s family of Pixel Pro devices and the Samsung Galaxy S25 are set to be among the first to get access to Skylo’s partner satellites, enabling emergency narrowband connectivity when cell towers are out of reach.
“There will be no cost to customers and any capable device can take advantage of this irrespective of price plan,” Verizon spokesperson Karen Schulz told SpaceNews.
Starting next year, Schulz said Verizon customers with a compatible device can also send general text messages via space, even to those not compatible with Skylo’s network.
Verizon is the first mobile carrier to announce plans to launch supplemental smartphone connectivity with Silicon Valley-based Skylo commercially.
The companies did not release financial or technical details about their partnership, which comes two years after Apple enabled space-based SOS services on its latest iPhones with Globalstar’s L-band satellites.
Skylo has previously said compatible devices could send and receive texts via geostationary satellites on its network with a five-to-15-second latency.
Verizon is also an investor in AST SpaceMobile, which is developing direct-to-smartphone satellites that would use cellular frequencies from the telco and other partners, instead of L-band radiowaves already approved for use from space.
Connectivity from AST SpaceMobile satellites in low Earth orbit would also come with lower latency and reach standard smartphones already on the market.
“We are very excited not only to work with AST, but to be a long-term investor in the success of their satellite services,” Schulz said.
“Until their satellite array is launched and functional, we wanted to make sure all of our customers with capable devices have the same basic satellite messaging connectivity.”
Verizon’s terrestrial telecoms rival AT&T is also one of AST SpaceMobile’s partners.
SpaceX is due to fly AST SpaceMobile’s first batch of five operational satellites in the first half of September.
However, like the rival direct-to-smartphone service SpaceX is developing, AST SpaceMobile needs to overcome interference concerns to get the regulatory nod it requires to provide commercial services.
