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Iridium reports growth in 2Q 2009
Posted on August 11th, 2009 No commentsIridium Satellite LLC released its operating and financial results for the 2nd quarter 2009. Although the number of subscribers rose by healthy 23.9% to 347,000 (compared to the same period of 2008), the revenue remained flat, growing by just 1.2% to $82.7 million. Still, the net income jumped by more than 50% to $28.6 million, which is quite impressive.
By attracting new subscribers and releasing new products and services (such as the Iridium 9555 handset and the OpenPort maritime communications system) in the last several quarters, Iridium is going to be well positioned to enjoy recovery in the global economic climate.
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A solo row across the Atlantic with Iridium
Posted on August 9th, 2009 No comments
This coming December, Katie Spotz, a young American from Ohio, will undertake a solo row across the Atlantic Ocean. After 2,500 miles and 70-100 days at sea, she will become the youngest person ever to row an ocean solo and the first American to row from Africa to South America. With this endeavor Katie promotes safe drinking water projects around the world, that’s why her row is named Row For Water.
Besides other equipment on the boat, she will have an Iridium 9505A satellite phone for communicating with the land crew, updating her event blog and, of course, for any emergency situation (which we all hope won’t happen). So keep tuned to Katie’s blog and Twitter account for updates! Good luck, Katie!
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Iridium needs to launch new satellites?
Posted on September 16th, 2006 No commentsA Chicago-area Daily Herald had an interesting article on Motorola and its ill-fated Iridium satellite venture in the 1990s. Motorola spent $5 billion building this mobile satellite network just to see it go bust in just a year after start of operations in 1998. Motorola has since been battling the financial consequences in the courts, while the new Iridium Satellite LLC enjoys increasing revenues ($200M in 2006?) and subscriber base (about 162,000) and plans to replace its aging fleet of 66 low-earth-orbiting (LEO) satellites by 2013.
Something wrong must be here. LEO satellites usually have about 5-7 years of lifetime. Iridium launched its satellites in the late 90s and they are now long overdue for replacement and could start falling off the sky any minute. Another issue could be the money needed to build and launch new satellites. With competition increasing, it may not bee easy for find another Motorola to invest and/or lend resources for such a cause. We’ll see…