Filed by Starry Holdings, Inc.
Pursuant to Rule 425 under the Securities Act of 1933
and deemed filed pursuant to Rule 14a-12
under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934
Subject Company: FirstMark Horizon Acquisition Corp.
Commission File No.: 001-39585
Date: January 12, 2022
SPACInsider
Podcast
Interview with Chet Kanojia, Starry, Inc. and Amish Jani, FirstMark Horizon Acquisition Corp.
January 12, 2022
NICK CLAYTON: Hello and
welcome to another SPACInsider Podcast. Im Nick Clayton and this week my colleague Marlena Haddad and I will be speaking with Chet Kanojia, the co-founder of Starry. Starry announced a business
combination with FirstMark Horizon Acquisition Corp. in October. It is an internet service provider deploying home internet with wireless broadband. We talk about the economic advantages to this approach and why legacy internet players have held off
disruptors for decades. We also speak to Amish Jani, President and Chairman of FirstMark Horizon, to get the SPAC-side view of the transaction as well as some of the unique terms that this merger includes. Take a listen.
CLAYTON: We are really excited to get into the ways Starry can shake up home internet. But first, I just want to get into your history of
entrepreneurship, Chet. You have been working to disrupt this space for quite some time. Can you walk us through some of the lessons you picked up through your previous ventures Navic and Aereo that led to Starry?
CHET KANOJIA: Yeah, I am one of those diseased individuals that is serially starting companies. And, it was kind of interesting to hear your podcast
with Bill Gross where he decided he was going to parallelize the process. So Amish, maybe there is life after this yet. But, yeah, I have been in the telecommunications space since the very inception of my first company which I started in about
2000. It was in the same space as well. We were suppliers of software to cable companies and then I started Aereo. But, just fundamentally fell in love with the sector, just because it is really difficult, interesting, and the reason for all of that
is because its for this intersection of really complicated technology, capital, regulatory issues, really multi-faceted, multi-dimensional teams have to come together and makes it really interesting as a challenge. The rewards are great. You
can really do some meaningful work because consumers love the services that you are building and the experiences you can provide. So, its very fulfilling, enriching across multiple dimensionsboth intellectually and, ultimately, the
contribution youre making in the sector. And, these things tend to be non-discretionary for consumers. They tend to be difficult to execute, but really very sticky products and you can create some
rollback. We, collectively as a team, love this sector just because of all of those various features and things it requires you to do.
CLAYTON:
Yeah, and you mentioned how complicated it is. For Internet service providers, so much of the economics are kind of built around the infrastructure and getting that infrastructure out there as your roll into client areas. How is Starry
approaching that as a relative newcomer to some of these markets?
KANOJIA: This sector has been pretty bullet-proof from a disruption perspective.
Probably the simplest reason is, number one the cost is incredibly high to build networks, and second it takes an inordinate amount of time and a lot of physical effort, right. You look at anybody building of fiber network, they are trenching and
they are hanging wires and pole and all kinds of sort of physical effort which makes it really, really difficult to execute. And, basically, youre looking at about 40 percent customer acceptance in any geographic area to justify a
wireline overbuild which is basically building a new network in those areas. And, even then, its really, really hard because you know cities will have historical districts where you cant dig things up or you cant trenchthe
list goes on and on. And, one of the basic things Starry was focused on from day one is how do you reduce the cost of construction of these networks while