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Technology Stocks : The New Qualcomm - a S&P500 company -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RoseCampion who wrote (2071)	10/6/1999 7:36:00 PM
From: djane	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 13582

Long Fortune article. The Latest Satellite Startup Lifts Off. Will It Too Explode? Iridium and ICO are in Chapter 11, but Globalstar stands a better chance of becoming a viable global phone service. Its management structure gave all partners a voice, and a strong CEO orchestrated the egos. pathfinder.com [Interesting European jabs at QCOM as well...]

To: RoseCampion who wrote (2071)	10/6/1999 8:54:00 PM
From: A.J. Mullen	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13582

That's not the only competition for Omnitracks. There's a Spanish company, Zunibal, that uses the Inmarsat to do the same thing. The potential has been around for quite a while. International sailing races have been followed for some time by requiring boats carry a beacon that could be tracked. Similarly some countries make such beacons a requirement of licenses to fish in their economic zones. I've no idea which satellites Omnitracks has been using, but I doubt they ever had any exclusive rights. It's perhaps a wonder as to why there hasn't been significant competition before.

To: RoseCampion who wrote (2071)	10/8/1999 6:22:00 PM
From: Webster	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13582

Rose, regarding major OmniTRACS competition - I would not consider Orbcomm a competitor to OmniTRACS. Orbcomm network is designed for very very low amounts of data, specifically exception data. The amounts of data that can economically handle is only a fraction of the average OmniTRACS user. Orbcomm is a potential alternative for tracking assets. One to three messages per day of 6 to 16 characters. That data model is considered high end user for the orbcomm network. Orbcomm is not an alternative data network for messaging, data reporting, SCADA and other similar applications. There are extreme network characteristics and economics that will prevent Orbcomm from ever being competition to OmniTRACS. OmniTRACS is working with Orbcomm in hopes of having a trailer tracking alternative for their customers. Orbcomm could be used in alarm, meter, tank level reading and other applications where one message per day or less is sent (6 to 16 chracters) over the network. In these applications Orbcomm may be an excellent network to be considered. They are still young and have many hurdles to overcome. Thanks Webster