I think there's a risk of overreaction here.
The 1.50-2.00 has been on AirTouch's website for a long time as the estimated retail price; it sounds to me like they just haven't decided to change it yet. If/when Iridium is still around in five months, and Irid's real retail price is known, there will be time to set a price for G*. We know Air Touch's cost is <<.75/min (assuming they pay G* a full 0.5/min and allowing a generous .25/min for the capital and operating costs of the GWs, G&A, etc.) So there will be room to move. In the meantime, it would be best if AirTouch just kept it's lips zipped on pricing (which they can't control, anyway.)
I'm a little more worried about the handset price, because, according to LBros, Irid's handset costs are now in the 600-700$ range and they'll be retailed at about 1000$. We know G* paid an average of about 1200$/UT. Some of that was probably non-recurring development cost, and some of the order was for more expensive phone booth terminals, so probably we'll be OK, but it's not clear.
FBoW, it looks to me like G*'s "regional roll-out starting in the third quarter" is going to start in Argentina, S. Africa and (maybe) Europe, Brazil and China, not the US of A. We need to recruit some board members in those countries. |
