AnswerID: 274929 Submitted: Tuesday, Dec 04, 2007 at 09:52
Underdog
replied:
I am the
Pivotel Managing Director and I would like to take the opportunity to directly address some of the Globalstar issues being raised. I apologise for gatecrashing the
forum and will go away if you don't find the information here at least a little bit helpful.
Pivotel is the parent company of Globalstar
Australia. The Globalstar service is being affected by the performance of the satellite constellation and this is frustrating and even angering some people. At Globalstar
Australia we resell the airtime but have no ownership interests in the satellites. So we also get frustrated with satellite gaps. Currently we believe the phones can connect and make calls around 60-70% of the time. Globalstar in the US has launched 8 new satellites, 5 are in operation and the remaining 3 are being moved to their orbit locations and will become operational in 2008. Some improvement has occurred over the past 3-4 months and we expect to see some further improvement next year however we expect from there it will get a little worse over time. Globalstar in the US is working to launch a new satellite constellation commencing in mid 2009. Because of the reduced quality of service we will cutting our satellite per minute call rates by 50% for all Globalstar users from January 2008 through until December 2009.
In addition, we are planning to launch the Iridium service under
Pivotel in February next year. Most of the call plans rates will be identical to the current Globalstar plans but without the 50% discount. The service will use standard mobile numbers that can also provide access to the Vodafone network at great call rates. Because we will use standard mobile numbers it won't be expensive to call one of our Iridium phones. There will be an opportunity for existing customers to switch to Iridium on a subsidised handset and carkit offer. There won't be any need to enter into a whole new network agreement. A minimum term will apply. We will be writing to all of our customers in the next 1-2 weeks with this same information and the offer will be made available from late January.
For those of you who have stuck with us I am grateful. In
Australia we cannot control the satellites but we do try to limit the impact upon you and have been working on the Iridium alternative for some time to ensure we offer a better service than our competitors. With a good network of dealers around the country and a very competent and responsive call centre team we aim to proviide the best possible level of support.
Reply 4 of 6
