Well, yes, no and maybe. How's that for fudging a response?
If G* slipped, and it doesn't look like they are, despite the rumors,
I think it would be perceived as a failure to make a major milestone.
Since this milestone has been slipping so much, a lot of people may get the impression that there are some fundamental problems. (Original
business plan had a launch in Aug of 97, then Oct, then Dec, and now
Feb.) So, I think a slip now would cause a significant loss of stock
price.
It is important to remember that the first Iridium launches slipped like crazy, too. But they weren't public yet, so not too many
people cared, and weren't watching it like a hawk vis-a-vis G*.
But, in my opinion, if the Delta failed, then I think that it would be seen as a Boeing-MacDac problem. One that was foreseen in the G* business plan (they have assumed one launch failure in there model).
A failure on-orbit may or may not hurt G*, depending on what it is. I can tell you right now there will be a G* on-orbit failure. You just can't launch 56 satellites and not expect one mishap. But if the failure is a unique anomaly, then that's one thing. Iridium has thus far felt two such "one-timers". But if the problems was constellation wide.... OUCH! |
