One NZ launches with SpaceX collaboration announcement

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#3340176 7-Feb-2025 14:22

Hi there, I work at One NZ supporting some of our Enterprise customers with this new Satellite TXT service and I can provide some more info around the questions I've seen coming up here. Great to see some of you trying it out!

I'll focus on How it works and happy to answer further questions about this. I can't really get into Why it works in some ways vs. others or what might be coming in the future. The easiest way to add some detail is by the Android vs. iPhone experience as they are a little different.

Android:

Any Android phone can scan the list of available network operators and if there is a satellite overhead then it will likely be visible in the Network operators list as shown in the screenshot above
If the phone hasn't attached to the "One NZ SpaceX" network before or hasn't had a recent software update to translate it, then the name may show as "53013" as you can see in that screenshot
In order to attach manually you must have an eligible phone model and plan - details on our Satellite TXT web page https://one.nz/why-choose-us/spacex
Eligible phones are those we have tested and that provide a good user experience
But you don't need to do this manual selection and when you are outside of One NZ cell-tower coverage your phone will attach to the One NZ SpaceX network automatically although first time may take a few minutes
Once attached, the network name "One NZ SpaceX" will be received from the satellite and displayed in your network banner at the top of the screen
Your Android phone itself does not know that the satellite network is any different to a 4G cell-tower network.

iPhone 14 range & newer:

You need to have iOS18.3 or later and the Service Provider settings file "One NZ 62.1" or later (these are the latest versions as of writing this)
You will now see the additional Satellite toggle in Mobile Data Options settings as shown in the screenshot a bit further above and it defaults to ON
But the "One NZ SpaceX" network or 53013 will NOT show up in the list of available Networks if you do a manual search - iOS considers it a Satellite network rather than a mobile network
When you go out of One NZ cell-tower coverage and your iPhone attaches to our satellite service you will see "One NZ SpaceX SAT" in the network banner name
When your phone is attached to the One NZ SpaceX network and there is no coverage from any other mobile network then the iPhone Emergency SOS message over satellite service is still available to you i.e. the two services are complimentary.

I hope this is helpful information for those of you trying the service out.

DjShadow

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#3340178 7-Feb-2025 14:51

Do you guys have a rough idea on what the gap between Direct-to-Cell satellites is?

Method I'm trying to test:

Disable Wifi
Turn off my second Sim
Go to Manual Carrier Selection and set my connection to either 2degrees or Spark to simulate a non-coverage area

I get the Satellite symbol by the battery and no-signal showing, tried sending a test text to my second sim but wouldn't send. Gave it a few mins but no change.

timmyh

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#3340180 7-Feb-2025 15:01

DjShadow:

Do you guys have a rough idea on what the gap between Direct-to-Cell satellites is?

Method I'm trying to test:

Disable Wifi
Turn off my second Sim
Go to Manual Carrier Selection and set my connection to either 2degrees or Spark to simulate a non-coverage area
I get the Satellite symbol by the battery and no-signal showing, tried sending a test text to my second sim but wouldn't send. Gave it a few mins but no change.

What phone are you using, what plan are you on?

DjShadow

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#3340183 7-Feb-2025 15:06

timmyh:

DjShadow:

Do you guys have a rough idea on what the gap between Direct-to-Cell satellites is?

Method I'm trying to test:

Disable Wifi
Turn off my second Sim
Go to Manual Carrier Selection and set my connection to either 2degrees or Spark to simulate a non-coverage area
I get the Satellite symbol by the battery and no-signal showing, tried sending a test text to my second sim but wouldn't send. Gave it a few mins but no change.

What phone are you using, what plan are you on?

iPhone 15 Pro Max and the $65 Medium plan. Not seen the text yet saying this feature is now available.

timmyh

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#3340189 7-Feb-2025 15:18

Your mobile plan is fine but iPhone has been updated in iOS18.3 so will be trying to only let you see the Satellite TXT service when you are out of One NZ cell-tower coverage, not sure how it is going to respond to that being simulated. You may need to go to a location genuinely out of One NZ coverage to try it out.

boosacnoodle

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#3340225 7-Feb-2025 17:31

DjShadow: Go to Manual Carrier Selection and set my connection to either 2degrees or Spark to simulate a non-coverage area

Of course this would not work. Think of SpaceX as like roaming or if you remember back in the bad-old days when 2degrees used to roam onto then Vodafone.

If you hardcode your phone to either 2degrees or Spark, your phone cannot then roam onto SpaceX.

If you have an iPhone, you can no longer force this either.

You need to be out of all service for this to work.

DjShadow

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#3340247 7-Feb-2025 18:55

Ok thanks, my thinking was given the Starlink coverage had it’s own carrier code then my phone would be looking for it as the primary connection wasn’t working

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Batman

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#3340266 7-Feb-2025 20:00

timmyh:

Hi there, I work at One NZ supporting some of our Enterprise customers with this new Satellite TXT service and I can provide some more info around the questions I've seen coming up here. Great to see some of you trying it out!

do you think internet over satellite will ever come to prepay or is it wishful thinking?

MaxineN

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#3340269 7-Feb-2025 20:34

Batman:

timmyh:

Hi there, I work at One NZ supporting some of our Enterprise customers with this new Satellite TXT service and I can provide some more info around the questions I've seen coming up here. Great to see some of you trying it out!

do you think internet over satellite will ever come to prepay or is it wishful thinking?

I would hope so, but the business case and the ROI has to be there.

Prepay vs Pay Monthly are different segments both technical and support wise.

Pay Monthly is the premium side so consider this a premium feature, but I wouldn't be surprised if it does. Keyword being IF.

It's probably not public yet what the plans are future wise. It's still growing right now. But never say never.

Ramblings from a mysterious lady who's into tech. Warning I may often create zingers.

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boosacnoodle

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#3340272 7-Feb-2025 20:48

Batman:

timmyh:

Hi there, I work at One NZ supporting some of our Enterprise customers with this new Satellite TXT service and I can provide some more info around the questions I've seen coming up here. Great to see some of you trying it out!

do you think internet over satellite will ever come to prepay or is it wishful thinking?

We don’t even have internet or calling for PostPay yet. Prepay is a long way off, if it is ever feasible. Given it’s taking sometimes upwards of 3 minutes to send 150 characters or less. I don’t think you’re going to be streaming Netflix, even if it were available.

Batman

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#3340276 7-Feb-2025 21:25

boosacnoodle:

We don’t even have internet or calling for PostPay yet. Prepay is a long way off, if it is ever feasible. Given it’s taking sometimes upwards of 3 minutes to send 150 characters or less. I don’t think you’re going to be streaming Netflix, even if it were available.

Last I read they are waiting on a new satellite to service our region. Let's see. Would be good, in my travels 90% of my trips have no cell reception.

Oblivian

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#3340279 7-Feb-2025 21:59

Batman:

Last I read they are waiting on a new satellite to service our region. Let's see. Would be good, in my travels 90% of my trips have no cell reception.

Getting OT, but There's no one satellite. They're not geostationary. But strings of 20-30 spaced out following each other. Circling similar incline. NZ and west coast of NZ positioned just right (so we are live as T-Mobile is). As the earth rotates it hits another row. Well..for internet at least there's enough to work that way

But there's less new generation ones with cell capabilities so the gaps between passes are longer

The first gen ones are being deorbited ~5 a day to make room for later generations.

Zoom in to see the service area cells. You'll get 1-3 passing through them at a time. But not all are cell capable so there will be retries. That's where the ~6min gaps come in. Roughly a cell transit

https://satellitemap.space/

phoebonacci

19 posts

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#3349108 1-Mar-2025 23:52

timmyh:

Hi there, I work at One NZ supporting some of our Enterprise customers with this new Satellite TXT service and I can provide some more info around the questions I've seen coming up here. Great to see some of you trying it out!

...

Must admit I had a total mare of a time trying to get satellite SMS with OneNZ/SpaceX to work. I switched to One NZ specifically to get this service and bought a new Oppo Find X8 Pro in order to make it possible.

Had about as poor an experience as can be imagined signing up in store and purchasing the device - a trainee served me which I don't hold against her, but she made a mistake, which her manager had no interest in helping her find, and when he did finally assist he then left for the day immediately afterward while she was still fixing up the rest of the request which - you guessed it - failed again. After a 4th attempt it all went through okay. Total time taken? 1h15. Crazy.

Anyway, that was at the end of last year and I planned to go on a 5 day 4 night hike where I felt I'd be a little out of my depth and was excited by the prospect of being able to txt out to whanau to let them know I'm okay.

I tested the SMS by stopping in a dead zone that I frequently pass through, and was completely unable to get a connection. I put a support request through One NZ and they assured me it would work and I just needed to be patient.

Weather delayed things for a while but at the start of Feb I took the hike on the St James Walkway. Well, I tried to send about 15 txts via satellite over those few days and not a single one managed to go through.

Typical of my experience was on the second morning when I looked at my phone and it had a message:

Android System
No Internet
You may be out of data from One NZ SpaceX. Tap for options.

This had shown up overnight, but the SMS messages I'd tried to send had not been picked up or delivered. Tapping for options gave me bugger-all and there was no sign that OneNZ SpaceX was still present.

So, resuming my hike, I stopped in a huge clearing with the sky about as broad as can be. Nothing would send. No sign of "One NZ SpaceX" after 15 minutes. Sandflies were biting so I chose to keep moving.

About 2 clearings later my phone vibrated in my pocket and I was delighted because I thought for sure the messages must have gone out - but no, instead a pocket of 4G had been found and I received a bunch of concerned WhatsApps from people lightly concerned that they hadn't heard from me. I replied to them. I sent normal SMSes as well via the terrestrial network. Delays and sputters and so on but everything went back and forth fine!

So I don't know. I'm really keen to hear from other people who've managed to wring some joy out of what seems to me to be an over-hyped and under-delivered offering.

I couldn't find a way to manually switch to "One NZ SpaceX" on the Find X8 Pro.

@timmyh you seem on-to-it but unfortunately the One NZ people I've talked to have not been very useful - this was before my "in the field" experience though, but it's put me off contacting them since because their engagement was so feeble the first time.

Anyway, keen to monitor this space but I won't be relying on this service again.

scottjpalmer

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#3349110 2-Mar-2025 00:52

I've been able to manually select and use the service remarkably well. Some messages take a minute or 2 to send, others send instantly.

I was really surprised to see RCS message delivery and read receipts and even RCS indication of the other person typing, RCS stickers send, etc. I've had numerous chats where multiple successive messages were delivered and receipted pretty much as fast as on the terrestrial cell network.

That said, I am nowhere near ready to rely on it and won't be for quite some time. Nobody should.

phoebonacci

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#3349111 2-Mar-2025 00:59

Maybe I'm wrong but my understanding is that RCS, like MMS, requires mobile data. Therefore if you're seeing RCS work it's not via satellite, which would permit bare-bones SMS only.

Hopefully @timmyh can clarify. I'd love to be wrong. It would explain that goofy "out of data" message I received.

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