The CEO of LightSquared, a big time Democratic party donor, was threatened with fraud charges by the SEC yesterday.
Actually, those tests weren’t so good after all: LightSquared’s broadband system actually disrupted 75% of the GPS receivers used during government testing.
Morrissey also notes these disturbing facts, considering the Obama administration’s strong support for Lightsquared:
In a press event today, LightSquared announced that just-completed tests prove that its internet service will not interfere with GPS.
According to the company, the three private companies — Javad GNSS, PCTel and Partron — that make GPS equipment have been testing interference solutions and those tests have gone well. “Preliminary results show that GPS devices tested in the lab easily surpass performance standards thanks to these newly developed solutions,” Ahuja said. “We are confident that this independent testing will mirror testing being done by the federal government.”
Here’s another perspective:
Jim Kirkland, vice president of Trimble and a founding member of The Coalition to Save Our GPS, is trying to slow LightSquared’s momentum. “It is obviously extremely premature to claim at this point that these latest tests demonstrate that LightSquared’s proposed repurposing of the mobile satellite band for terrestrial operations is ‘compatible’ with high-precision GPS,” Kirkland says in a statement. “Even if new equipment solutions are fully tested and verified, these existing high-precision receivers will have to be retrofitted or replaced. LightSquared still refuses to accept the financial responsibility for addressing interference to existing devices, and so has not offered a comprehensive solution in any way, shape, or form.”
Obama’s stimulus bill: $7 million per house to provide seven homes internet access in Montana.
The Defense and Transportation departments have slammed the FCC over its approval of a new broadband service that they think will interfere with GPS.
