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Technology Stocks : KVH Industries, Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: William JH who wrote (1373)	9/10/2002 6:59:48 PM
From: Sector Investor	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 7249

I don't pretend to know fully either, but I do know a ground based infrastructure is part of the system, as the link indicates. I also read somewhere that there was/is a major problem with satellite radio in urban areas, with the Mercury light bulbs used to light streets. It seems they are not shielded and emit an RF signal on the same wavelength (or something close to that), that was causing an effect like when you drive under power lines with AM radio. I remember reading about a lawsuit by XM to the lightbulb manufacturer. I know the defense was "We were here first, cost is prohibitive", etc. I wonder how that came out? I'll have to do some checking.

To: William JH who wrote (1373)	9/10/2002 7:27:29 PM
From: Sector Investor	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 7249

William, I don't want to appear demeaning of Satellite radio. It's just that I feel this is just an interim step towards consolidated satellite TV/Radio/Internet. How long can it survive standalone as technology advances? The two competitors have each invested tons of money here, from the satellites, to ground structures, to programming studios and a national control center. This is a lot of startup and operational cost - and a lot of risk in this economic downturn. They have to reach a critical mass of subscribers to make money. xmradio.com KVH's approach lets others provide the content, the satellites and the infrastructure. They provide the satellite antennas to transmit/receive directly to satellites, and basically collect a "piece of the action" on the service, without exposing themselves to high startup and operational costs. They don't need to reach any certain level of subscribers to be profitable.