We have so many different partners and so many different segments. I don’t think you can read much into first quarter results either way. Hamed Khorsand Okay, thank you. Matthew Desch Yes. Thanks Hamed.Operator The next question comes from Louie DiPalma with William Blair. Please go ahead.Louie DiPalma Matt, Tom, and Ken. Good morning. Matthew Desch Good morning Louie.Louie DiPalma For Matt and Tom at the Barcelona conference, Qualcomm announced that it will make Snapdragon satellite available for, I believe, mid tier Snapdragon four devices, in addition to the previously announced Snapdragon eight high end premium devices. And last quarter, you provided a TAM estimate of around 80 million to 100 million phones a year. And I was wondering how is that impacted with the potential inclusion of Snapdragon 4 devices that may incorporate the satellite feature?Matthew Desch It will, I mean, our view of from what we understand there’s a lot more of those mid tier Snapdragon devices being shipped to satellite phone manufacturers.
And there are high end ones that we’ve already sort of described. So the opportunity is quite large. It will just depend on how many phone manufacturers decide to adopt a technology. Our hope would be high, because it’s not incrementally a lot to necessarily do that. But I think most of the focus really on ‘late ’23 and ’24 introductions will be at the high end. But I do see long term that that will expand.Louie DiPalma Great. Thanks Matt. And are you able to say if the royalty rate for the mid tier Snapdragon 4 devices is lower than the royalty rate for the premium Snapdragon 8 devices? Or is that still in negotiations? Matthew Desch It’s totally premature to talk about either relative levels or actual levels of royalties of any sort at this point.
Sorry. Louie DiPalma No problem. That’s completely understandable. And for Tom. Tom you referenced higher R&D this year I think for new devices. Is that R&D to support the Qualcomm partnerships such that our Iridium software developers and like radiofrequency engineers like actually working on that? Or is this higher R&D to support like other new devices, perhaps in the consumer IoT sector? Thomas Fitzpatrick I would say other devices in the consumer sector and generally. Matthew Desch We just we feel there’s a lot of opportunity right now for Iridium. And given our success and growth, we have a long list of things that we want to develop both in our that require both work on the ground and gateways work in cloud, work in device work. There is just a lot of opportunities and so have expanded our investment because we believe it’s the right time to do that because we believe we can support it in our growth projections here.Louie DiPalma Great.
And, Tom, did you also say as it relates to the IoT ARPU that there might actually be expansion going forward? Or did I mishear that?Matthew Desch No. We said that the service functionalities should drive higher data usage which would drive higher APRUs load.Louie DiPalma Okay, and for Certus would that be for consumer devices?Thomas Fitzpatrick So I think it was a [consumer] device pushing pictures at higher usage and higher APRU. Louie DiPalma Okay. Got it.Matthew Desch There’s been some adoption amongst our partners, and they have plans to introduce products in the future, which would offer even more capabilities than we have today. I mean, obviously, it will take some time for that to affect overall APRUs because those have to get in the market.
And there’s an awful lot of devices already given that we’re going to be pushing a million devices as well just that use more narrowband technology, but it’s obviously a positive long wind on APRU. Louie DiPalma Great. Thanks. That’s it for me. Matthew Desch Thanks Louie.Operator [Operator Instructions] This concludes our question — it looks like we have a follow up from Ric Prentiss from Raymond James. Please go ahead.Ric Prentiss Yes. Thanks. I hear there’s a few minutes left on a busy earnings day, probably be remiss if we don’t ask the recession question or economic condition question. Are you seeing any impact out there globally as far as what the macro market is? Or it’s just the demand for the product still just super strong?Matthew Desch Well, I don’t think we’ve seen any big impact whatsoever.
We just held our first partner conference in a number of years here in California a couple of weeks ago. I’d say the enthusiasm of our 500 plus partners is as high as I’ve ever seen in the future. There was no wringing of hands in any specific market segment. I keep looking for particularly things like the consumer type segment to possibly be affected in different places.And it’s hard to see those trends yet. But I think we’re being conservative overall here. I mean, we’re not projecting out too far or anything just in case there are bigger effects. We have history. I mean, 2008 2009 wasn’t a great time in the world, and we didn’t see a lot of impact then, haven’t, we’ve kind of experienced sort of regional market downturn and I think our satellite services like Iridium serve are very valuable services.
They’re ones that are critical to life, that sort of thing. And I don’t think they’re the first ones that would be cut in some sort of recession.Ric Prentiss Thanks. Last one using up some of the time, Tom, any thoughts on the balance sheet [even do] on the debt level or anything we might do as far as your interest costs?Thomas Fitzpatrick We have a billion dollar capital on our so we’re hedging on a billion dollars. We paid down $100 million. And so we’re diligent about it, but we feel like we’ve contained our exposure to interest rate. And we’re, I think, my outline what we’re going to do, we’re going to continue to buy in the shares, make strategic investments, pay dividend. That’s, the game plan.Ric Prentiss Any update on an area and as far as how that business is going?Matthew Desch I’m still very positive.
I mean they continue to grow. They’re investing in their commercial data services business, and they’re seeing traction there. I believe that’s the long term opportunity, actually starting now that the air traffic has come back to more normal levels that both is kind of increased their revenue levels, but also they’re starting to get some other markets moving in terms of adopting their air traffic control services. So I would say most of the positives over there.Ric Prentiss And Tom you mentioned an investment by [indiscernible] I missed that number. What was the investment? Thomas Fitzpatrick 10 million Ric.Ric Prentiss 10, 1-0.Thomas Fitzpatrick 1-0.Ric Prentiss Okay, great. Thanks, everyone. Stay well. Operator The next question is a follow up from Landon Park with Morgan Stanley.
Please go ahead. Landon Park Thanks for taking the follow up. I just wanted to ask about the service aviation products. I mean, now that those are coming into the market, I was wondering if maybe you could remind us of the TAM that you see there for on the commercial plane front for the larger service products and I seem to remember pricing being quite released pricing expectations at your analyst day were quite high, I think $600 plus. Is that still the right range to think about there?Matthew Desch They are still too early to project because they don’t our partners [Technical Difficulty] commercial expectations for the service product line versus others. We know it should be higher, because more data for the [Technical Difficulty]. The initial applications are going to be primarily for the broadband products are going to be in commercial airliners, which is why those things are always flying.
