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Technology Stocks : Loral Space & Communications -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Thomas who wrote (2616)	4/16/1998 2:04:00 PM
From: Geoff	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 10852

Actually, now that you mention it, there are some recent ramblings about the upcoming Zenit launches: ========== Subject: Re: Zenit record Date: Mon, Apr 13, 1998 21:47 EDT From: Readware Message-id: <1998041401470101.VAA26098@ladder01.news.aol.com> You do not have the probability caclulation correct. I referenced the Sci Amer article (an easy one for laymen) on "The Law of Averages Repealed". I know the article has math in it, but Boolean probaility theory does not have predictive force. You can believe that or you can refuse to believe it. But probability calculations do not work. And this from one whose doctoral work was in mathematical issues on the divisibility of continua. Subject: Re: Zenit record Date: Mon, Apr 13, 1998 22:12 EDT From: Readware Message-id: <1998041402121600.WAA03411@ladder03.news.aol.com> The Zenit launch will have three precessions-- four sats at a time. Zenit offered to launch 24 sats for G, and the offer was turned down. The best way to get a read on the Zenit-2 is to talk to the people at Huntington Beach. They are using the Zenit-3 for SeaLaunch. They know the Zenit-2 better than anyone outside of LOR and G. By the way-- Robert Berry, the President of SSL-- his specialty at Defense when he served as deputy was-- you got it, Russian rockets. I have been told by those who would know that no one in the US knows the Russian rocketry better than him. Take that for what it's worth. It takes 20 days to build a Zenit rocket. The Zenit to launch G* is not being made by Ukranian workers. The software was not developed by Zenit-- it was developed in America. The Zenit's persuasiveness is its payload launch capability. The Zenit launch vehicle has been completely refabbed. It is nothing like the Zenit that had prior failures. I would offer the opinion that no Russian or Ukranian engineer will give one the clear and unvarnished portrayal of the Kosmodrome launch facilities for a variety of reasons. I have posted in the past that I have spoken to engineers outside of G* and LOR on Zenit-2 as currrently configured. They do not see any greater risk from Zenit-2 than from Proton which has launched 7 Iridiums in 2 precessions, on I believe three ocassions now. Will Zenit-2 blow up on the launch pad? I doubt it. Will there be a problem? I think G* can look to lose a few sats from the three launches. No one expects 36 sats to be launched perfectly. How many? 3, 4. Management has factored that in already. Additionally, Loral has 10 Boeing launches on order, 4 G* sats each, over and above the current publicly posted launch schedule. For what reason? In case there is a catastrophe. Probability of success/failure? No one can tell. Before Iridium was launched, the sages spoke darkly of possible failures, and what they would mean. What failures were there? Two sats don't operate-- and it was not due to launches. Iridium stated the falures derived from the Phoenix factory where they were made. JCraig noted here long ago that there are a thousand things that can go wrong in a launch-- in the Ariane catastrophe it was a duplicate software program that the French believed finally caused the French Guyana catastrophe. Who was to know? As for the NY Times article: without going into detail (God forbid I get subpoenead by a grand jury)-- the TIMES has not published stories about how satellite companies were not allowed to go ahead with plans to develop laser immobilisation from GEOs for SDI, a technology that would have rendered useless incoming ICBMs and SLBMs. General Graham's program was defunded-- and yet there are scientists in Universities today who will argue that such a satellite program should have been allowed to be developed-- to protect America from nuclear missiles. Instead the TIMES writes in LeCarre fashion about how Hughes and Loral, two major sat powers, gave secrets to the Chinese. Iridium will be next. There is no truth to the stories. And you should have heard some of the others. Subject: Re: Cyberstar Date: Tue, Apr 14, 1998 00:27 EDT From: Readware Message-id: <1998041404271301.AAA25581@ladder01.news.aol.com> Add to that that C* has dedicated a $20 million advertsing campaign for its service rollouts this year. I am not as bullish as others are about the home PC market sat delivery for C*, but we will see. The small business market is a much better opportunity, where demand is actual and quite strong now. It definitely is very strong there. It does not appear to be that robust right now in home use. But we will see.