Verizon has signed a deal to provide cellular service from space through AST SpaceMobile beginning next year.

Shares of AST SpaceMobile, a space-based cellular broadband network, soared more than 10% before the market opened Wednesday.

SpaceMobile's network is designed to operate across premium low-band spectrum, its own licensed L-band and S-band spectrum, and up to 1,150 MHz of mobile network operator partners’ low- and mid-band spectrum worldwide, the company said.

“The agreement will extend the scope of Verizon’s 850 MHz premium low-band spectrum into areas of the U.S. that would benefit from the ubiquitous reach of space-based broadband technology," Abel Avellan, founder, chairman and CEO of AST SpaceMobile, said in a statement.

Financial terms of the agreement, which expands on a

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