EoW January 2009

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EuroWire – January 2006 26 9
Transat lant ic Cable
In October, Motorola’s co-chief executive Sanjay Jha, who
took over as head of the mobile phone division only in
August, announced an overhaul of the division. The company
is scrapping several software platforms in favour of three
main systems, including the Google-developed Android and
Microsoft’s Windows Mobile. According to Ms Wong, Mr Jha
cancelled a number of product launches scheduled for the
first half of 2009. As a result, she wrote, “Motorola will face a
challenging couple of quarters before its planned release of a
Windows Mobile-powered smartphone and an Android phone
in the second half of the year.”
Total mobile phone shipments in the US reached 47.4 million
in the third quarter of 2008, up 6% from a year earlier. Ms Joy,
of Strategy Analytics, attributed the bump to wireless service
providers and other distributors stocking up on inventory ahead
of the holidays. In her view, the pace of growth would likely
decline in the fourth quarter as American consumers cut back
spending in their tough economy.
Elsewhere in telecom . . .
Tighter household budgets and attractive options for
wireless service are causing Americans in greater numbers
to relinquish their traditional landline phones in favour of
cell phones. According to a JD Power and Associates survey
released in October, some 27% of cell phone customers say
their cellular service has replaced landline, which averages
about $40 a month per line, for daily calling. Three out of
five of these customers have given up their landline service
altogether, while the rest retain but do not actively use their
wired connections, the study found.
As noted by Cox News Service (3rd October), the shift to
wireless has broad implications for both consumers and
providers including AT&T Inc and Verizon Communications
Inc. Both companies have been deploying new broadband
networks and wireless services even as they compete with
cable companies for a shrinking pool of landline customers.
Chief technology officer John Donovan of AT&T shared that
company’s view that, while mobile service is its top priority,
old landline networks still have a lot of life left in them. “With
technology generally, the later you can deploy, the cheaper
and more capable it is,” Mr Donovan told Cox. “So every
year we spend billions of dollars rehabbing and upgrading
our network. And every day that goes by where we do
that, our network gets more capable and more and more
future-proof.”
The Russian Space Agency said on 31 ❈ ❈ st October that
preparations had begun for the launch of a rocket with a
US Telstar satellite on board. A Zenit-3SLB carrier rocket
equipped with a DM-SLB booster was scheduled to lift off
from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan at the end of
December.
“A preliminary assessment of the launch facilities at
Baikonur was carried out this week in preparation for the
launch of the Telstar 11N satellite,” the space agency said
in a statement. The Zenit-3SLB is an upgraded three-stage
version of the rocket used at Sea Launch’s floating platform
in the Pacific Ocean.
As reported by the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti,
the Telstar 11N, built by Space Systems/Loral for Loral Skynet
(NewYork), will provide services from 39 high-power Ku-band
transponders spread across four different geographic beams
in each of North and Central America, Europe, Africa, and the
maritime Atlantic Ocean Region.
Steel
Even before the New Year, American steel
makers had begun to cut back production
in the economic downturn
US Steel (Pittsburgh) announced it was laying off 500 workers ❈
❈
in the US and 175 in Canada in response to lower demand for
steel. The cuts went into effect in the Pittsburgh area and at
company plants in the South and Midwest.
Also in mid-November, Beta Steel (Portage, Indiana) ❈
❈ imposed
the first of two temporary layoffs, and the entire mini-mill
would be shut down mid-December through early January.
The producer of hot-rolled bands operates a 700,000
tons-per-year electric arc furnace melt shop and a rolling mill
with capacity of 1.1 million tpy. The company was purchased
for $350 million on 31st October by Novolipetsk Steel, Russia’s
fourth-largest steel maker by output.
Aviation
Boeing, with troubles of its own, may aid
some good customers inconvenienced
by the global credit crunch
Boeing Co (Chicago) reached a tentative agreement on a new
contract with the union representing its white-collar engineers.
The four-year contract agreement, which must be approved by
a majority of the 21,000 members of the union, would avoid a
second punishing strike at the plane maker’s plants in the Seattle
area. A 58-day strike by its 27,000-member machinists’ union
ended 2nd November.
Boeing also said it was pushing back the schedule on the
cargo version of its 747 jumbo by up to nine months, a delay
attributable at least in part to the diversion of engineering talent
to the new 787 Dreamliner, itself about a year and a half behind
schedule. The machinists’ work stoppage and supplier problems
contributed to a 38% drop in Boeing’s third-quarter earnings to
$695 million from the year-earlier $1.11 billion.
Despite these difficulties, the company in October announced a
handsome offer. As reported by the Chicago Tribune , Boeing CEO
Jim McNerney told analysts that the global aviation leader was
prepared to step in as banker for airline customers struggling
to finance new aircraft in a period of frozen capital markets
worldwide. (“Boeing Set to Lend a Hand – and Some Cash – to
Strapped Customers,” 22nd October)