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Technology Stocks : IRID - Iridium World Communications IPO Announced! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ilaine who wrote (2581)	3/8/2000 1:14:00 PM
From: Rocket Scientist	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 2693

Cobalt, the problem with your analogy is that the Irid satellites only work with a ground system and licensing structure controlled by Motorola, and that is expensive to operate/maintain. And the buyer has to assume the liability/cost to safely deorbit the satellites, which have only 3-4 years of useful life remaining and have proven to be unreliable. Having said all that, I also expected someone would step forward, since at this point they could buy the system nearly for nothing except the obligation to safely operate/and/or deorbit it.....but it's becoming clear that Mot and the Gateways are making pretty firm plans to walk away from the whole mess. Motorola has already disbanded it's sales Irid sales team...and 9 of the present 12 Gateways were being eliminated even before McCaw walked away.