Eccentric Orbits

The Iridium Story

By: John Bloom

Narrated by: Donald Corren

Length: 18 hrs and 48 mins

Publisher's summary

The incredible story of Iridium - the most complex satellite system ever built, the cell phone of the future, and one of the largest corporate bankruptcies in American history - and one man's desperate race to save it.

In the early 1990s, Motorola, the legendary American technology company, developed a revolutionary satellite system called Iridium that promised to be its crowning achievement. Light-years ahead of anything previously put into space, and built on technology developed for Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars", Iridium's constellation of 66 satellites in polar orbit meant that no matter where you were on Earth, at least one satellite was always overhead, and you could call Tibet from Fiji without a delay and without your call ever touching a wire.

Iridium the satellite system was a mind-boggling technical accomplishment, surely the future of communication. The only problem was that Iridium the company was a commercial disaster. Only months after launching service, it was $11 billion in debt, burning through $100 million a month, and crippled by baroque rate plans and agreements that forced calls through Moscow; Beijing; Fucino, Italy; and elsewhere. Bankruptcy was inevitable - the largest to that point in American history. And when no real buyers seemed to materialize, it looked like Iridium would go down as just a "science experiment".

That is, until Dan Colussy got a wild idea. Colussy, a former head of Pan Am now retired and working on his golf game in Palm Beach, heard about Motorola's plans to "de-orbit" the system and decided he would buy Iridium and somehow turn around one of the biggest blunders in the history of business.

In Eccentric Orbits, John Bloom masterfully traces the conception, development, and launching of Iridium and Colussy's tireless efforts to stop it from being destroyed, from meetings with his motley investor group to the Clinton White House, the Pentagon, and the hunt for customers in special ops, shipping, aviation, mining, search and rescue - anyone who would need a durable phone at the end of the Earth. Impeccably researched and wonderfully told, Eccentric Orbits is a rollicking, unforgettable tale of technological achievement, business failure, the military-industrial complex, and one of the greatest deals of all time.

©2016 John Bloom (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Good book

Interesting. I liked it, especially as it was a true story. Would recommend for those who like technology. Good background on Motorola.

Financial roller coaster and political nightmare

Being in the trucking business I had a ringside seat to watch this fight and many others play out. I've watched the telecoms come and go. I was one of the early MCI customers, was given an Iridium demonstration and eventually ended up with a phone bill that looked like a social security number. But being a loyal Motorola customer I always wondered what happened. This book has answered all those questions and then some. Absolutely unbelievable.

fascinating listen

This a fascinating story the is a prelude to the coming debate about the international space station's fate.

great book,but the audio editing needs work

great book. great quality. but at least two dozen times in the book a sentence or two gets repeated (with a slightly different tone). Seems obvious to me that some editing got missed.

The narrator repeating himself isn't that bad

The story was a little slow in the middle but I would still definitely recommended.

Magnificent Book - discombobulated editing.

Well researched - concise storyline in a highly complicated fiasco - hat's off to the author and Dan Colussy

Audiobook Editors must have been Motorola employees.

Great tech tale, too much minutiae

I love tech, history, and space, and I'm generally interested in business. This story combines all of these areas to tell the 20+ year story of Iridium. I loved the overall story, but was by turns bored and irritated by the hours taken to discuss the intricate details of insurance and government contract procurement. A subtitle might be "how the sausage is made: a detailed list of ingredients and processes."

If you enjoy name-dropping, there are hundreds of individuals named, from Al Gore to Michael Jordan to dozens of Pentagon personnel. Personally, I found the endless names detracted from the core narrative of 10-20 individuals.

Still, Iridium is a big deal, and this telling does it justice. It does a good job of explaining the relevant technology, and detailing the relationship between capital markets (i.e. investors and lenders) and socially important "megaprojects". I feel like this book could have been 20-30% shorter, but greatly enjoyed the other 70%.

As real as it gets

There are countless misconceptions about technology entrepreneurship. This book is exceptionally researched, highly entertaining, and the most accurate account of the real world challenges of building something truly revolutionary I have ever read. Many thanks to the author for the undoubtedly long hours invested in creating it.

Iridium, starlink 0.5

this was an interesting story about a well known but poorly understood leader in the LEO satellite constellation business. The story about how close it was to a wasteful "death" was surprising gripping. If the subject interests you then it's worth a lieten/read!

Great Storytelling

A great and captivating narration. Love the politics and underdog story. Excellent reading and recording.