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Telecommunications Globalstar gets $A912m funds to launch new generation satellites
Telecommunications Globalstar gets $A912m funds to launch new generation satellites | Globalstar gets $A912m funds to launch new generation satellites |
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| by Stuart Corner | |
| Friday, 03 July 2009 | |
  
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To support these new services Pivotel's Globalstar ground infrastructure will be upgraded to support a full IP switching and backbone network. According to Bolger a substantial multi-million dollar investment will be required to upgrade its three Australian gateways located in Dubbo, NSW, Mt Isa in QLD and Meekatharra in WA. Globalstar says that, with the funding now complete, it expects to be the first global mobile satellite voice and data company to offer an IP-based network. The Globalstar 2.0 next-generation network includes the second-generation satellite constellation, designed and manufactured by Thales Alenia Space, and the company's new ground segment developed by Hughes and Ericsson Federal. It is designed to provide Globalstar customers with high quality voice and data services beyond 2025 and increased data speeds of up to 256kbps in a flexible all IP configuration. The financing will also facilitate the introduction of Globalstar's next-generation satellite interface chipsets being designed by Hughes Network Systems, the company said. "Globalstar has long been regarded by many as having the best voice quality of all satellite services, and the new generation 2.0 satellites will see a return to the very high service availability and performance that characterised Globalstar's early years," Bolger said. Globalstar has been struggling for several years because of a high failure rate of its first generation satellites which, despite it launching several spares resulted in degraded coverage (a friend of the author's who kayaked around Tasmania in early 2007 with a Globalstar phone reported that it was almost useless). In early 2007 shareholders who had bought in at an IPO in 2006 mounted a class action alleging that the company failed to disclose in its prospectus the true extent of a known problem with its satellites. Globalstar at that time had just announced that a previously identified degradation problem affecting many of its satellites was worse than thought and could seriously impact its ability to offer continuous voice and data services. Although it planned to launch a number of spare satellites the company said a full solution would not be available until launch of its second generation satellites, then scheduled for late 2009. In December 2006 Globalstar awarded what was then Alcatel Alenia Space, a Euro 611m contract for a constellation of 48 low-earth-orbit (LEO) satellites. The contract called for Globalstar to begin taking deliveries of the new satellites in the summer of 2009 with launches beginning shortly thereafter.
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