Property and Equipment and Intangible Assets

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2024

Property and Equipment and Intangible Assets

Property and Equipment and Intangible Assets

7.     Property and Equipment and Intangible Assets

Property and Equipment

Property and equipment consisted of the following:

	Depreciable
	Life			As of December 31,
	(In Years)			2024		2023
				(In thousands)
Equipment leased to customers	2	-	5	$	1,005,750	$	1,181,193
Satellites	6	-	15		1,718,865		1,718,865
Satellites acquired under finance lease agreements (1)		15			—		344,447
Furniture, fixtures, equipment and other (2)	2	-	12		801,650		908,924
5G Network Deployment equipment (3)	3	-	15		5,382,706		4,263,327
Software and computer equipment	2	-	8		1,816,749		2,111,305
Buildings and improvements (2)	5	-	40		334,213		381,757
Land (2)		-			12,041		17,513
Construction in progress		-			1,544,726		1,802,000
Total property and equipment					12,616,700		12,729,331
Accumulated depreciation					(5,387,611)		(5,327,384)
Property and equipment, net				$	7,229,089	$	7,401,947

(1) This decrease is primarily related to the Nimiq 5 finance lease that was extended in October 2024 and as a result is currently accounted for as an operating lease.

(2) The change primarily relates to the Sale and Transfer of Assets to EchoStar. See Note 1 for further information.

(3) Includes 5G Network Deployment assets acquired under finance lease agreements.

Construction in progress consisted of the following:

	As of December 31,
	2024		2023
	(In thousands)
Pay-TV	$	268,423	$	162,055
Wireless		1,276,303		1,639,945
Total construction in progress	$	1,544,726	$	1,802,000

Depreciation and amortization expense consisted of the following:

	For the Years Ended December 31,
	2024		2023		2022
	(In thousands)
Equipment leased to customers	$	147,282	$	166,950	$	191,746
Satellites		125,230		134,948		148,051
Buildings, furniture, fixtures, equipment and other		41,835		91,942		40,703
5G Network Deployment equipment		718,729		371,640		29,992
Software and computer equipment		343,487		235,820		153,040
Intangible assets and other amortization expense		95,641		180,621		153,541
Total depreciation and amortization	$	1,472,204	$	1,181,921	$	717,073

Cost of sales and operating expense categories included in our accompanying Consolidated Statements of Operations and Comprehensive Income (Loss) do not include depreciation and amortization expense related to satellites, equipment leased to customers, or our 5G Network Deployment equipment and software.

Activity relating to our asset retirement obligations was as follows:

	As of December 31,
	2024		2023
	(In thousands)
Balance, beginning of period	$	278,287	$	183,135
Liabilities incurred		20,929		74,189
Accretion expense		27,815		20,963
Balance, end of period	$	327,031	$	278,287
Total included in Other long-term liabilities	$	327,031	$	278,287

The corresponding assets, net of accumulated depreciation, related to asset retirement obligations were $216 million and $217 million as of December 31, 2024 and 2023, respectively.

Satellites Pay-TV Segment

Our Pay-TV segment currently utilizes nine satellites in geosynchronous orbit approximately 22,300 miles above the equator, seven of which we own and depreciate over their estimated useful life. We also lease two satellites from third parties: Anik F3 and Nimiq 5, which are accounted for as operating leases. Through the third quarter of 2024, our Nimiq 5 satellite was accounted for as finance lease within our Pay-TV segment. However, during October 2024, we extended the Nimiq 5 lease and as a result it is currently accounted for as an operating lease.

As of December 31, 2024, our Pay-TV segment satellite fleet consisted of the following:

		Degree	Lease
	Launch	Orbital	Termination
Satellites	Date	Location	Date
Owned:
EchoStar X	February 2006	110	N/A
EchoStar XI	July 2008	110	N/A
EchoStar XIV	March 2010	119	N/A
EchoStar XV	July 2010	61.5	N/A
EchoStar XVI	November 2012	61.5	N/A
EchoStar XVIII	June 2016	61.5	N/A
EchoStar XXIII	March 2017	110	N/A
Under Construction:
EchoStar XXV	2026	110	N/A
Leased from Other Third-Party:
Anik F3	April 2007	118.7	April 2025
Nimiq 5	September 2009	72.7	October 2029

Satellite Under Construction

EchoStar XXV. On March 20, 2023, we entered into a contract with Maxar Space LLC for the construction of EchoStar XXV, a DBS satellite that is capable of providing service to the continental United States (“CONUS”) and is intended to be used at the 110 degree orbital location. During the fourth quarter of 2023, we entered into an agreement with Space Exploration Technologies Corp (“SpaceX”) for launch services for this satellite, which is expected to be launched during 2026.

The EchoStar XXV contract was included in the Sale and Transfer of Assets to EchoStar on January 10, 2024. Subsequently, on May 2, 2024, the EchoStar XXV contract was included in the Orbital II Transfer from EchoStar and is recorded in “Property and equipment, net” on our Consolidated Balance Sheets. For the year ended December 31, 2024, capital expenditures for EchoStar XXV totaled $121 million, which includes $74 million for capital expenditures incurred after May 2, 2024, which is included in “Purchases of property and equipment,” and $47 million for capital expenditures incurred between the Sale and Transfer of Assets to EchoStar on January 10, 2024 and May 2, 2024, which is included in “Other, net” within “Net cash flows from investing activities” on our Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows. See Note 1 for further information.

Satellite Anomalies and Impairments

Operation of our DISH TV services requires that we have adequate satellite transmission capacity for the programming that we offer. While we generally have had in-orbit satellite capacity sufficient to transmit our existing channels and some backup capacity to recover the transmission of certain critical programming, our backup capacity is limited.

In the event of a failure or loss of any of our owned or leased satellites, we may need to acquire or lease additional satellite capacity or relocate one of our other owned or leased satellites and use it as a replacement for the failed or lost satellite. Such a failure could result in a prolonged loss of critical programming or a significant delay in our plans to expand programming as necessary to remain competitive and thus may have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

In the past, certain of our owned and leased satellites have experienced anomalies, some of which have had a significant adverse impact on their remaining useful life and/or commercial operation. There can be no assurance that future anomalies will not impact the remaining useful life and/or commercial operation of any of the owned and leased satellites in our fleet. See Note 2 for further information on evaluation of impairment. There can be no assurance that we can recover critical transmission capacity in the event one or more of our owned or leased in-orbit satellites were to fail. We are not aware of any anomalies with respect to our owned or leased satellites that have had any such significant adverse effect during the year ended December 31, 2024. We generally do not carry commercial in-orbit insurance on any of the satellites that we own and therefore, we will bear the risk associated with any uninsured in-orbit satellite failures.

Intangible Assets

As of December 31, 2024 and 2023, our identifiable intangibles, including intangibles subject to amortization and non-amortizing intangibles consisted of the following:

	As of December 31,
	2024				2023
	Intangible		Accumulated		Intangible		Accumulated
	Assets		Amortization		Assets		Amortization
	(In thousands)
Technology-based	$	63,773	$	(61,157)	$	63,766	$	(60,590)
Trademarks		135,134		(81,351)		135,134		(71,640)
Contract-based		41,500		(41,500)		41,500		(41,500)
Customer relationships		628,598		(621,140)		628,598		(535,778)
Total	$	869,005	$	(805,148)	$	868,998	$	(709,508)

These identifiable intangibles are included in “Intangible assets, net” on our Consolidated Balance Sheets. Amortization of these intangible assets is recorded on a straight-line basis over an average finite useful life primarily ranging from approximately two to 20 years. Amortization was $96 million, $181 million and $154 million for the years ended December 31, 2024, 2023 and 2022, respectively.

Estimated future amortization of our identifiable intangible assets as of December 31, 2024, excluding non-amortizing intangibles, is as follows:

For the Years Ending December 31,	Total
	(In thousands)
2025	$	13,534
2026		11,838
2027		11,355
2028		10,872
2029		10,283
Thereafter		5,747
Total	$	63,629

Goodwill

Goodwill represents the excess of the consideration transferred over the estimated fair values of assets acquired and liabilities assumed as of the acquisition date and is not subject to amortization but is subject to impairment testing annually or whenever indicators of impairment arise.

During the year ended December 31, 2023 we recorded a noncash impairment charge for goodwill of $225 million in “Impairment of long-lived assets and goodwill” on our Consolidated Statements of Operations and Comprehensive Income (Loss). See Note 2 for further information. The non-recurring measurement of fair value of goodwill is classified as Level 3 in the fair value hierarchy. As of December 31, 2024 and 2023, we have zero goodwill recorded on our Consolidated Balance Sheets.

Regulatory Authorizations – Pay-TV and Wireless Segments

As of December 31, 2024 and 2023, our Regulatory Authorizations with indefinite lives consisted of the following:

		As of December 31,
	Segment	2024		2023
		(In thousands)
Owned:
DBS Licenses	Pay-TV	$	677,409	$	677,409
600 MHz Licenses	Wireless		6,192,575		6,213,335
3.45-3.55 GHz Licenses	Wireless		7,329,093		7,327,989
1695-1710 MHz, 1755-1780 MHz, and 2155-2180 MHz	Wireless		972		972
AWS-3	Wireless		5,557,828		5,618,930
Subtotal owned			19,757,877		19,838,635
Noncontrolling Investments:
SNR			4,271,459		4,271,459
Capitalized Interest (1)			6,811,062		8,523,682
Total Regulatory authorizations, net as of December 31, 2024		$	30,840,398
Leased from EchoStar (2):
700 MHz Licenses	Wireless		701,803		711,871
AWS-4 Licenses	Wireless		1,928,688		1,940,000
H Block Licenses	Wireless		1,671,506		1,671,506
MVDDS Licenses	Wireless		24,000		24,000
28 GHz Licenses	Wireless		2,883		2,883
24 GHz Licenses	Wireless		11,772		11,772
37 GHz, 39 GHz and 47 GHz Licenses	Wireless		202,392		202,533
3550-3650 MHz Licenses	Wireless		912,200		912,939
3.7-3.98 GHz Licenses	Wireless		2,969		2,969
Total Leased from EchoStar		$	5,458,213		5,480,473
Total Regulatory authorizations, net as of December 31, 2023				$	38,114,249

(1) See Note 2 for further information.

(2) See Note 1 for further information on the Sale and Transfer of Assets to EchoStar and see Note 16 for Related Party Transactions with EchoStar.