Iridium Pushes Ahead Satellite Project

oxide7 writes "Iridium (IRDM) continues its push into the market for satellite data and telemetry services, as it announced the company that would build its second generation of satellites. Iridium's old network of 66 satellites was designed for voice calls; the new satellites will also be able to handle data more efficiently, and include cameras as well. The company also plans to share the satellite platforms with some scientists for use in studying the Earth."

Comments

Skynet

[TheKidWho]

This is it, once google connects to this network, we will never be able to turn it off once it becomes sentient...

Whose to say it hasn't and slyly guided the engineers to push this technology as part of its plan...

Cameras??

[spectrokid]

Just one little sentence. They will include cameras as well. WTF?? Privatised spying? Own your own weather-sat? Delivering Google-earth quality pictures (or better) is not only going to take one hell of a lens, but also a hefty infrastructure on the ground. They must have a solid business case. This isn't like putting a "camera" on a 50€ cellphone.

Re:Cameras??

[f3rret]

This is Iridium we're talking about, they don't worry about details like "buisiness plans". When they first rolled out their service their business plan depended on the fact it would eventualy be as pervasive as cellular phones and that sure worked out fine.

Re:Cameras??

[spectrokid]

The answer: For commercial, government and scientific organizations, Iridium NEXT will also offer new business and earth observation opportunities through hosted secondary payloads on the 66 Iridium NEXT satellite network.

Re:Cameras??

[Barsamin]

Sure they couldn't recoup their costs... but they made it up in volume!

Re:Can Slashvertisements get any more obvious?!

[SeaFox]

Many business magazines include ticker symbols for the companies they mention in articles, even if the article is a serious piece that is critical of the company. So I think this assumption of yours that a ticker symbol is some sort of flag that something is an advertisement is plainly wrong.

Re:Can Slashvertisements get any more obvious?!

[Rusty KB]

A slashvertisement for *who*? Raise you hand if you can afford a satellite!

Business Plan?

[backslashdot]

I really hope they solved the 3 issues with their previous attempt: 1. Cost per minute of usage 2. Need for huge antennas (adds to bulk/weight) 3. Massive battery required (makes the phone bulky/heavier).

Re:Business Plan?

[Biogenesis]

As a suburban inhabitant who's used to small mobile phones it's natural for you to assume that satellite phone size is a major issue, but for people who would regularly require satellite phones they only need to have a better cost:performance* ratio than remote communication alternatives, such as HF radio.

*performance in this context would be a subjective measure which includes factors such as reliability, size, weight etc.

Re:Business Plan?

[eudean]

Satellite communications is expensive (and naturally the market is smaller than terrestrial phones so even at the same cost the price per subscriber would need to be greater). Higher data rates require greater SNR and therefore larger antennas. Receivers also need to consume more power to acquire and process a low SNR signal. Perhaps they can improve these things incrementally, but they're kind of fundamental to the nature of their service.

Re:Business Plan?

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

On the plus side, they should be able to absolutely cash in on the heavily subsidized "US puppet warlords in dusty hellholes with dubious cell coverage who need to chat with their CIA handlers" market...

Re:Business Plan?

[ptbarnett]

On the plus side, they should be able to absolutely cash in on the heavily subsidized "US puppet warlords in dusty hellholes with dubious cell coverage who need to chat with their CIA handlers" market...

Iridium satellites were about to be de-orbited, because no one stepped up to buy it even at the fire-sale price. Suddenly, a previously unknown company came out of nowhere to buy Iridium, and it already had a long-term contract with the US government that effectively guaranteed their long-term operating expenses.

When Globalstar protested because the contract was held, the GAO put a hold on the contract. The Pentagon had the hold removed, citing national security. The GAO investigation apparently ended after the 100-day limit with no action.

http://www.spaceandtech.com/digest/sd2001-01/sd2001-01-009.shtml

Re:Business Plan?

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Not to mention, of course, that said previously unknown company set up shop in the fine town of McLean, Virginia, which is within spitting distance of Langley, and a classic location for those who have business in Washington; but don't want to deal with actually having to live there. Neighbors include SAIC and Booz Allen Hamilton.

They do have civilian customers of course; but you don't get the sense that the place was set up primarily for their benefit.

Re:Business Plan?

[zulux]

A friend borrowed my Iridium phone and had to use their emergency services (911) - the call center that they were hooked up to was in his words "frighteningly competent." ...

Rambling Iridium thoughts:

I've enjoyed the service myself - with the phone and and a Psion Revo (It has a native serial port), I can telnet to any of my severs while in the woods. Strangely, it let's me relax knowing that I can help out my users.

At around 2400 baud - don't use SSH. Oh... Screen is your friend as it does cut out enough.

If you use a PC - it come with some proxy software and a proxy server that will remove/compress images, but any computer with a serial port can use it as a modem. Sadly, modern pdas lack serial ports, but old Posion Revos/5-series are cheap, last a long time, and have awesome keyboards and work well.

I have an older Motorola Iridium phone, so I don't know if this setup would work with the more modern phones.

some more on Iridium

[AffidavitDonda]

bbc has a nice article on that too: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10212836.stm

Re:Can Slashvertisements get any more obvious?!

[Anonymous Coward]

The first OSCAR ham radio satellite was paid for by collecting spare change from thousands ham radio operators around the planet, so there are small groups who have flown satellites.

Planning for bankruptcy?

[confused one]

I could have sworn launching the first set of satellites bankrupted the original Iridium owner. Not that that's ever stopped anyone.

New Iridium satellites ?

[ctrl-alt-canc]

I hope they will be less reflective. Their flares cause troubles to astronomers.

Re:New Iridium satellites ?

[The Grim Reefer2]

I was wondering the same, as well as if they would be a predictive as the current ones. My 6 YO enjoys seeing them so we check the schedule at heavens-above.com regularly for bright ones at "reasonable" times.

Not true.

[Aldric]

Iridium are the best duplex LEO network (better for low power applications than GEO) and the only serious competition to Inmarsat. Inmarsat would not have made nearly as much progress if they had no decent competition - GlobalStar are simplex and Orbcomm are as abysmally useless are always.

Re:Can Slashvertisements get any more obvious?!

[Alioth]

...and it's really annoying. If people really want to look at the stock price it's not hard to look it up. The worst articles are the ones that are written like:

"Steve Ballmer of Microsoft (MSFT, people, news) today challenged Novell (NOVL, people news) to a duel today after Novell announced it was to use Solaris (SUNW, people, news) to power its new IBM (IBM, people, news) Intel (INTL, people, news) based servers"