Chapter 13 Interest Rates and the Markets for Capital and Natural Resources Start Up: Building the “Internet in the Sky” The race to build the “Internet in the Sky” started in the early 1990s One plan was to build 840 low earth-orbiting (LEO) satellites that would allow information to be sent and received instantaneously anywhere on the face of the globe At least that was the plan A number of telecommunication industry giants, as well as some large manufacturing companies, were impressed with the possibilities They saw what they thought was a profitable opportunity and decided to put up some financial capital Craig McCaw, who made a fortune developing and then selling to AT&T, the world’s largest cellular phone network, became chair of Teledesic, the company he formed to build the LEO satellite system McCaw put up millions of dollars to fund the project, as did Microsoft’s Bill Gates and Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia Boeing, Motorola, and Matra Marconi Space, Europe’s leading satellite manufacturer, became corporate partners Altogether, the company raised almost a billion dollars The entire project was estimated to cost $9 billion But, alas, a decade later the company had shifted into very low gear From the initial plan for 840 satellites, the project was scaled back to 300 satellites and then to a mere 30 Then, in 2003 in a letter to the U.S Federal Attributed to Libby Rittenberg and Timothy Tregarthen Saylor URL: http://www.saylor.org/books/ Saylor.org 676