Satellite radio outside North America

SDARS satellite radio broadcasts of music or video to mobile receivers has largely been a North American phenomenon. While there are North American specific satellite TV networks like DirectTV and Dish Network, satellite TV has long been a global phenomenon in certain markets.

Automobiles typically have Bluetooth audio, which may one day be used with 5G broadcast instead of individual mobile data streams. This may stymie the growth of SDARS in other continents. Despite a global need for wide-area and rural broadcast radio coverage, SDARS is only widespread in North America. SiriusXM has made massive investment in a “long game” with receiver availability just as mobile internet streaming became widely feasible. Other continents’ markets may be too fragmented despite the large population, with not enough intercity user mobility to make the subscriber base big enough, and the cities dense enough to also need hundreds of terrestrial repeaters.

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