Ukraine will become the first European country to offer Starlink mobile services when Kyivstar’s top Kyivstar operator launches the messaging service by the end of the year and broadband satellite mobility in mid -2026, said Managing Director Oleksandr Komarov.

Tests have begun under an agreement with Space X at the end of 2024 to allow for Ilon Musk’s company to launch services that allow mobile phones to be connected directly to satellites, bypassing traditional landline towers.

Immediate connection devices are connected to satellites equipped with modem operating such as a mobile tower, emitting telephone signals from space directly to smartphones.

In two phases

“The first phase concerns the exchange of over-the-top messages, so the exchange of messages through WhatsApp, Signal and other applications will be implemented at the end of this year,” Komarov told Reuters in Rome.

“And probably at the beginning of 2026, let’s be sure, in the second quarter of 2026, we will be able to provide mobile satellite broadband.”

SpaceX did not respond to a commentary request sent by email.

The US T -Mobile provider will introduce a data service into its satellite -cell network, powered by Starlink in early October, the company said in June.

Komarov spoke before the Ukrainian recovery conference in Rome, three years after the Russian invasion, which will also attend President Volodimir Zelenski.

He said the main objective at the conference, the fourth of the start of the war in February 2022, was to support the Ukrainian government and create new business ties, some of which with Italian companies wishing to expand to the country.

Kyivstar, which belongs to the Veon telecommunications group, is also preparing for its introduction to the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, USA. Komarov said the plan is “moving” and hopes to be completed in the third quarter of this year.

“I think it will be an exemplary move,” he added. “The first in history, the immediate placement of a (a) Ukrainian entity on the US Stock Exchange during the war.”

They can withstand infrastructure

Komarov said Ukrainian telecommunications infrastructure have been well with Russia’s escalating attacks in recent weeks.

Last year, one of its attacks on electricity networks and transport lines caused a blackout daily in large cities, after turning off about half of Ukraine’s capacity available.

“I think we are much more durable than we were in 2022. At the moment we can operate our landline and mobile services up to 10 hours during the blackouts,” he said.