Stories about: Teledesic

The news that Bill Gates plans to cease being a full-time Microsoft employee in July 2008 was anything but surprising. It's been apparent for some time that Microsoft's founder and chairman (a title he will retain) is more energized by the work of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation than by the day-to-day churn of the software business. Taking on the world's many inequities and diseases has clearly emerged as a higher calling for a man whose single-minded focus has often been the key to his success.

Nortel Networks has shifted senior management, elevating President Bill Owens to vice chairman and CEO, and naming a former Cisco Systems sales executive as president and COO.

Nortel Networks has fired its president and chief executive officer (CEO), replacing Frank Dunn with William Owens, and has also delayed the release of its financial results for the first quarter of the year, the company said Wednesday.

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Thursday granted seven companies permission to offer services such as broadband Internet over satellites.

Signaling that its transition to a new top executive is complete, Nortel Networks on Thursday dissolved the Office of the Chief Executive, which the company formed as former Chief Financial Officer Frank Dunn took over as president and chief executive officer (CEO) of the company in November 2001.

Troubled satellite-phone operator Globalstar Telecommunications Ltd. announced Tuesday it is indefinitely suspending payment on its debt, as it attempts to develop a new plan to salvage the business.

At Dell Computer, wireless capabilities are high on its list of things to do this year, but choosing the right path to take is proving a bit tougher.

Bill Gates is sinking another $100 million into his cherished Internet-in-the-sky venture, helping restore confidence in the next-generation satellite business. The software mogul last week joined several international venture capitalists in providing a total of $1 billion of new equity in ICO-Teledesic Global Ltd., the holding company for the satellite ventures of wireless pioneer Craig McCaw. The holding company controls the successor to ICO Global Communications Ltd., a satellite voice and third-generation wireless company that emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May. It also controls Teledesic, a broadband IP satellite data network that Gates helped found in 1994 and is projected to begin service in 2004. The satellite business has been seeking a jolt of confidence since global calling and paging pioneer Iridium failed last year.

Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and several international investors yesterday announced that they have invested almost $US300 million in ICO-Teledesic Global, a company that says it plans to become a global provider of wireless "internet-in-the-sky" satellite communications services, including telephone, internet access and broadband services.

PARIS (07/11/2000) - Craig McCaw's satellite telecommunications holding company ICO-Teledesic Global Ltd. has rounded up about US$315 million in new investments, including $100 million from Microsoft Corp. Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates, ICO-Teledesic announced Tuesday.

Service providers have wanted to bypass terrestrial networks and political domains for years, but the cost of the necessary equipment alone is estimated to be not in the millions of dollars, but in the billions. Add to that the risks of a pioneer market, and an investor's concern can be easily understood.