WASHINGTON-Iridium L.L.C. has activated its global paging and messaging network, about two weeks after the commercial launch of its global satellite phone system.
Messaging tests have gone well, and Motorola Inc. and Kyocera Corp., which make the Iridium pagers, are shipping the devices to the 12 Iridium gateway providers around the world, said the satellite company.
Iridium has paging distribution agreements with Paging Network Inc. in the United States, Hutchinson in the United Kingdom and DSS Mobilink in India.
Although the mobile satellite services provider has made the system available for commercial deployment, not all paging distribution partners are selling the product yet.
According to Scott Baradell, director of corporate communications for PageNet, the exclusive provider of Iridium’s paging service in the United States, the company will begin beta testing the product in the next few weeks and plans to begin selling the service and devices to customers sometime next year.
“We’re currently on the verge of being in beta,” he said. “It wouldn’t be a full-scale commercial launch.”
The Iridium World Page service, like the phone system, uses pagers that can receive alphanumeric messages of up to 200 characters in 19 different languages, or numeric messages of up to 20 digits. The company is selling the services as a stand-alone feature or as an complement to the voice network.
The system is able to accept messages from various points, such as operator dispatch centers, touch-tone telephones, e-mail and the World Wide Web. The devices have a battery life of 30 days and can receive satellite-based messages inside buildings, at sea and even in airplanes, said Iridium.
“These pagers will allow customers to receive messages at a single Iridium contact number no matter where they travel, even in places where no terrestrial paging system has ever existed-or ever will exist,” said Dr. Ed Staiano, Iridium vice chairman and chief executive officer.
The paging system activation trailed the voice system launch because it needed more testing time, the company explained earlier. The original activation date for all Iridium services was Sept. 23, but due to product testing delays and satellite failures, the launch date had to be moved to Nov. 1. The voice system was given priority during this time, which is the reason the paging launch came later.
PageNet plans to charge about $500 for the Iridium paging device, with service packages ranging from $160 a month to $200 a month.
