Russia intends to switch on a commercial version of its homegrown answer to Starlink next year, according to people familiar with the programme cited by Reuters, the latest milestone in a project that has been promising to arrive for most of a decade.

The constellation is called Rassvet, the operator is a private aerospace firm called Bureau 1440, and the ambition is deliberately narrower than the American network it is meant to rival.

The scale tells the story. SpaceX has put thousands of Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit. Bureau 1440 plans to reach commercial service in 2027 with a constellation in the high hundreds, with figures around 288 to 292 satellites cited for the first operational phase, and a longer-term target near 900 by the mid-2030s.

Moscow has, for years, described the goal as something conceptually like Starlink rather than a like-for-like match, and the numbers keep that promise honest.

The hardware is further along than the rhetoric alone would suggest. In March the company launched 16 operational satellites, on 23 March, following a run of experimental craft in 2023 and 2024 under the Rassvet-1 and Rassvet-2 test programmes.

Bureau 1440 has described the satellites as carrying 5G non-terrestrial-network communications, laser inter-satellite links, an upgraded power system, and plasma thrusters, the standard kit for a modern broadband constellation.

Dmitry Bakanov, head of the Roscosmos space agency, told Reuters last September that several test vehicles already in orbit had been inspected and the production satellites modified accordingly.

Throughput targets have been published too. Bureau 1440 has advertised per-subscriber speeds ranging from 50 megabits to one gigabit per second, with planned coverage across more than 70 countries.

Those figures are claims rather than demonstrated performance, the distinction that separates a constellation on a slide from one carrying paying traffic, and only the commercial launch will test them.

Money has been committed, on paper at least. The Russian government has earmarked 102.8 billion roubles, roughly $1.26bn, for Rassvet, and Bureau 1440 has said it will add some 329 billion roubles, around $4bn, of its own through 2030.

The company has put potential demand at 1.5 to two million subscribers inside Russia and as many as 12 million worldwide, with coverage planned across more than 70 countries.

The 2027 date deserves a footnote. An earlier target slipped amid reported production shortfalls, which is the kind of detail that tends to recur in constellation programmes everywhere, not only in Russia.

Building satellites is one problem; building them fast enough, in the numbers a useful network requires, is a different and harder one. The 16 operational craft now in orbit are a start on a figure that needs to clear 250 before paying customers can be served.

There is a strategic reading that sits underneath the commercial one. A sovereign broadband network that does not depend on a foreign operator is attractive to any government that has watched Starlink become a factor in the war in Ukraine.

Whether Rassvet arrives on schedule, and at the throughput Bureau 1440 advertises, is the question 2027 will answer. The constellation, for now, is mostly a plan with a launch cadence attached.

TL;DR

Apple is preparing a bill-splitting feature for iOS 27 that photographs receipts, assigns items to individuals, and generates Apple Cash payment requests. The tool, expected to be announced at WWDC, competes directly with Splitwise, Venmo, and Cash App.

Apple is preparing a new iPhone feature that lets users photograph a restaurant receipt, assign individual items to different people, and automatically generate payment requests through Apple Cash. The tool will calculate each person’s share of the bill including item costs, tax, and tip, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing people with knowledge of the plan. Apple aims to announce the feature at its Worldwide Developers Conference as early as next week and ship it as part of iOS 27 this autumn.

The feature will be accessible through the Wallet app and within Messages, with an option to approve payments from an Apple Watch. Shares of PayPal and Block, which owns Cash App, pared their Monday gains on the news. Apple has been competing with Venmo and Cash App in peer-to-peer payments since integrating Apple Cash into iMessage, but the bill-splitting tool represents a more direct assault on the social payments category that third-party apps have dominated.

Why receipts matter

Bill-splitting apps like Splitwise, Tab, and Settle Up have built dedicated user bases around the specific problem of dividing group expenses. Most work by requiring users to manually enter amounts, a process that creates friction and errors. Apple’s approach, photographing the receipt and using image recognition to extract individual line items, removes the manual step entirely.

The integration with Apple Cash means the entire flow, from photographing the bill to receiving payment, stays within Apple’s ecosystem. Users do not need to download a separate app, create an account with a third-party service, or link a bank card to a new platform. Apple has systematically expanded its payments infrastructure since launching Apple Pay in 2014, and each addition makes the ecosystem stickier for users who already rely on iPhones for daily transactions.

Apple’s fintech track record

The bill-splitting feature continues a fintech expansion that has produced mixed results. Apple Pay is widely adopted and has become the dominant contactless payment method in many markets. Apple Cash’s peer-to-peer payments, the Apple Card credit card built with Goldman Sachs, a Goldman-backed savings account, and tap-to-pay for businesses have all followed.

Not all of those efforts have succeeded. The Apple Card partnership has weighed on Goldman Sachs’ financial results, and the bank is working to offload the business to JPMorgan Chase. Apple also discontinued a “buy now, pay later” service approximately a year after launching it. The pattern suggests Apple is willing to experiment aggressively in fintech but also willing to retreat quickly when a product does not gain traction or when a partner relationship becomes strained.

The competitive landscape

Splitwise is the most direct competitor. The app has built a loyal user base around tracking shared expenses across households, trips, and recurring group costs. But Splitwise requires users to actively open the app and manage balances, a workflow that Apple’s integrated approach could simplify significantly for casual use cases like splitting a restaurant bill.

Venmo and Cash App compete at a different level. Both are full-featured payment platforms with social feeds, merchant payments, and financial products. The fintech landscape is evolving rapidly as AI-powered banking platforms enter the market, but Apple’s advantage is distribution. Every iPhone is a potential bill-splitting device with no download required.

The feature also targets younger consumers who manage money primarily through apps rather than traditional banking. Mobile payments platforms globally are competing for this demographic by embedding financial tools into the apps people already use daily, and Apple’s Messages integration puts bill-splitting where group dinner conversations already happen.

Part of a broader iOS 27 update

The bill-splitting service is one of several Wallet app additions coming in iOS 27. Apple is also planning a tool that lets users create their own digital passes for events, gym access, and other uses. The Wallet app already hosts the savings account, Apple Pay, and digital keys for cars and homes.

The broader iOS 27 update will focus on artificial intelligence, a revamped Siri digital assistant, AI-powered photo editing tools, a new Siri camera mode, and performance improvements. Apple has positioned iOS 27 as a significant AI upgrade while using the Wallet additions to quietly strengthen its position in everyday financial services.