Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Microcap & Penny Stocks : Globalstar Telecommunications Limited GSAT -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: David Wiggins who wrote (7417)	9/16/1999 7:55:00 PM
From: Rocket Scientist	Respond to of 29987

Very interesting article from South Africa at mg.co.za Couple of months out of date, but provides pricing and performance comparisons between Irid, G*, ICO, as well as some useful "local" flavor to the question of sat phones.

To: David Wiggins who wrote (7417)	9/17/1999 2:36:00 AM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 29987

David, that's disappointing. Looks as though next to no service this year. So, off we go to 2000 and a slow rollout then. Not until the second half of 2000 will we be able to buy a handset in one place and use it in another?!! Good grief! Airtouch employees get to goof around with phones sometime before October maybe and "after several weeks" a softlaunch will be started. "Several weeks" after the beginning of October is the beginning of December or maybe the end of December. So, it looks like no Xmas sales. "Several" means more than 5 or 6, a "few" means up to 5. So it really isn't until Y2K that Globalstar is even softlaunching. That means a hard launch won't happen until everyone is over their hangovers sometime next year. It's a shame to hurry things, so how about March. Or 1 April. So, bluntly, nothing going on in 1999! <...That means Globalstar service will be launched slowly, with full commercial service on a global scale probably not happening until early next year...Even then, phones purchased in the United States will not work in other parts of th world until the system's ground stations are equipped with the capabvility to handle phones from different regions. That process could take as long as six months... ...First, several hundred hand-selected users-primarily AiraTouch employees--will begin using Globalstar service as soon as the end of September, Carnici said. After several weeks, Globalstar will enter what the company is calling a softlaunch phase, encompassing a larger group of people, including some who have indicated they are interested in purchasing a Globalstar phone... > That means all the noise about starting service with 32 satellites was just a lot of noise. That means the plan changed. That means it didn't work. All the fancy satellite launching and moving satellites around was a waste of time. I guess I won't be buying a handset in Geneva at the Telecoms show. There's something in all of this that does not compute. Managing the physical delivery of handsets well shouldn't be too hard. Phone FedEx and say, "Hey, can you pick up a bunch of handsets at Qualcomm's factory and send them to the addresses on the boxes? Bill us". I don't get the "Users have not been able to buy the phones from service providers yet because we don't want to repeat mistakes we've seen before". The mistake we saw was a super expensive constellation with space switching, a hugely expensive and large handset with indifferent quality. If Globalstar just started selling phones and minutes, that would not repeat the mistake which mattered. None of this makes sense to me. It's as though nobody really wants to actually go ahead and start the service up and sell it to people. Either the soft handoff doesn't work, or the billing is a mess, or something else is wrong. Roaming is all to hell until half way through next year, so it's a regional fill in only until then. All very weird. I see no need for caution. Airtouch should just get 10,000 phones from Qualcomm, stick them in their shops with a FOR SALE sign on them. $1200 for the phone, 70c a minute anywhere in USA. No monthly fee nonsense. Use it in terrestrial mode where service is available and here's a map where you can expect service to work. Airtouch would make more per minute than on terrestrial and they'd gain customers who don't like gaps! Pretty simple really. Where's the problem?