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Operator Kyivstar to launch Starlink mobile services in

mid-2026

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Kyivstar aims to foster new business ties for Ukraine

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Hopes to finalise U.S. listing in third quarter of 2025

By Angelo Amante and Gianluca Lo Nostro

ROME, July 10 (Reuters) - Ukraine will become the first

European nation to offer Starlink mobile services when leading

operator Kyivstar launches messaging by year-end and mobile

satellite broadband in mid-2026, Chief Executive Oleksandr

Komarov said.

Field tests have begun under an end-2024 deal with Space X's

commercial broadband constellation to allow tech entrepreneur

Elon Musk's company to launch direct-to-cell services in the

war-torn country.

Direct-to-cell devices connect to satellites equipped with

modems that function like a cellphone tower, beaming telephone

signals from space directly to smartphones.

"The first phase is over-the-top (OTT) messaging ... so

messaging via WhatsApp, Signal, and other systems ... it will be

in place at the end of this year," Komarov told Reuters in Rome.

"And probably at the beginning of 2026, let's be on the safe

side, Q2 2026, we will be able to propose mobile satellite

broadband data ... and voice."

SpaceX did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

US carrier T-Mobile will introduce a data service

on its satellite-to-cell network, powered by Starlink, at the

start of October, the company said in June.

Komarov was speaking ahead of a Ukraine recovery conference

Italy is hosting three years after the Russian invasion, with

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy also due to attend.

He said his main aim at the conference, the fourth since the

war began in February 2022, was to support the Ukrainian

government and establish new business ties, some with Italian

firms willing to expand in the country.

Kyivstar, owned by telecoms group VEON, is also working

towards a U.S. listing on the NASDAQ stock exchange. Komarov

said the project was "moving forward" and hoped to finalise it

in the third quarter of this year.

"I think it will be an exemplary move," he added. "The first

in history, the direct placement of (a) Ukrainian entity on the

American stock exchange ... during the war."

Komarov said Ukrainian telecom infrastructure was holding up

well under Russia's escalating assaults in recent weeks.

Last year one of its attacks on power grids and transmission

lines caused daily blackouts in major cities after it knocked

out about half Ukraine's available generation capacity.

"I think that we are much more resilient than we used to be

in 2022. Right now we can run our fixed and mobile services up

to 10 hours during the blackouts, even national blackouts."