Globalstar Launching 16 New Satellites

Globalstar will launch the first satellites of its second generation constellation. This will happen in the second half of 2009. These first satellites will be 16 of their latest and greatest achievements bringing quality service back to Globalstar customers.

Starting in late 2007 Globalstar began having more problems with the S-band satellite communication antenna, which is the duplex transmitter of their first generation satellites. They provide two way voice and data transmission. This created a gap in service for customers that were in line of site to one of the satellites that had a duplex transmitter problem. They could be without service for a number of minutes until a fully functioning satellite comes in line of site to their location. This causes dropped calls and periods of no service. Until Globalstar’s second generation constellation is launched and fully functional, Globalstar is offering its Optimum Satellite Availability Tool on their website. A user can access this tool and give the location where they plan to travel; the tool will give them a report when service will be available during a 24 hour period in that location.

Globalstar’s Simplex data and asset tracking services are fully functional. These services are used with Globalstar’s very popular SPOT Satellite Messenger launched in December of 2007. The Simplex data and tracking services use a different antenna that has not been affected. Tests have indicated that the Simplex data satellite service is operating at better than 99 percent performance. Globalstar’s current simplex data products will be designed to work with the second generation satellite constellation giving years of high quality service.