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Non-Tech : Bill Wexler's Dog Pound -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Michael who wrote (3437)9/4/1999 11:53:00 PM
From: Phil(bullrider)  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 10293
 
Micheal,

I am long LOR.

Why do you think QCOM has been running and LOR has been stalling.

Just wondering,
Phil



To: Michael who wrote (3437)9/4/1999 11:59:00 PM
From: Kevin Podsiadlik  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 10293
 
GSTRF is not IRID. GSTRF is a CDMA based satellite phone system.

This much I can tell you, CDMA technology would not have solved the problems IRID ran into. A gap in coverage is still a gap in coverage.



To: Michael who wrote (3437)9/5/1999 12:14:00 AM
From: Bill Wexler  Respond to of 10293
 
I'm not betting against Jacobs or QCOM. I'm betting against Bernie Schwartz, and a technology which will not compete effectively against digital cellular on a large scale and will probably not be able to generate a sufficient return as a niche business to make owning GSTRF's common stock worthwhile. Currently, GSTRF's bonds trade at around 65 cents to the dollar - driving the yields through the roof. If you think the business is viable, it would be much more interesting to simply purchase the bonds. Even if the bonds crawl back out of junk status, there is still an unacceptable risk that the common will get whacked, as the company will need to go back to the equity markets if they need to raise more cash.

Bernie Schwartz also runs LOR, which built the Globarstar sats.



To: Michael who wrote (3437)9/9/1999 12:06:00 PM
From: Marconi  Respond to of 10293
 
Hello Michael: GSTRF

I agree there should be caution here. Generally with emerging technologies, the first market entrant does not make money at it, but the second is the one well over half the time. The difference is often in the choices made. The second entrant often makes much better economic choices for the new product. The cheapshot corporate angle then, is to not be first, but be the closest second while making the best possible choices for the new product and market.

I know very little about CDMA. It seems important. If CDMA is superior to analog cellular telephony in use of bandwidth, and also integrates into satellite frequencies, then it may be possible for CDMA to have a portion of the cellular market if a handset and a satellite amount to a substitute for cellular towers containing older, lower bandwidth (hence more expensive per use) technology.

An analogy could be the satellite TV dishes, versus cable, versus broadcast towers and the networks. There is a place for each of them. In this case there is the analog and digital telephony infrastructure (including Internet), cellular, and satellite (emerging).

Iridium botched it with a bet your company proposition their clunk technology handset and network of satellites would be popular, while cellular telephones grew by leaps and bounds. Apparently from concept onward, it was all downhill for IRID.

Certainly the very specifics of the marginal costs of the GSTRF framework are very important to whether they will emerge into a going concern with their technology or be a flop, too. From a technological point of view, GSTRF should be in the position to do it well enough to be viable. But I have not looked into the specifics, yet, to test that assertion.
Best regards,
m



To: Michael who wrote (3437)9/13/1999 10:22:00 PM
From: Tatnic  Respond to of 10293
 
Hey Bill...haven't posted in a while but have been reading the threads from time to time--esp. yours. I know you don't look at TA much but GSTRF has been bouncing off pretty good support in the $24~$25 range and looks like it wants to run into the 30's. Interesting issue about the financials which ultimately do matter more than short-term technical movements. But if you think about it, not many of these companies have what you'd call stellar balance sheets. Kinda look like QWST and WCII did a few years ago. Speculative yes...but rewarding if you get in on the right side of the trend which looks to be up from here ST and IT.