After a very active tenure in the satellite industry, Joseph Wright resigned as chairman and director of Intelsat Ltd. and has moved on to a different business, but his impact will be felt in the satellite field for years to come.
“I spent 12 years with PanAmSat and Intelsat, from the time I joined the board until [my resignation],” Wright says. “During that period of time, there wasn’t so much an evolution of the business but a sea-change in the way satellite operators approached the markets and managed themselves as private sector companies and became profitable entities for shareholders. That’s tough to do — to convert from a business model that is primarily government oriented to one privately oriented. The industry has done a really good job of that.”
Wright served as CEO of PanAmSat from August 2001 until July 2006, when the company was acquired by Intelsat. Along with helping create the world’s largest satellite operator, Wright played a pivotal role in a period that saw commercial operators change their method of business. He pushed PanAmSat to increase its profitability by defining itself as a communications solutions provider and not a satellite company and also was a strong advocate for replacing larger satellites with lower-cost spacecraft carrying fewer transponders.
“When I first came on, the whole game plan of the successful operator was to get a slot, put up a satellite — hopefully the largest you could build — then take orders, because demand exceeded supply,” he says. “This is typical of brand new industries. The fixed satellite services business is not that much different than others, except it originated from government interests and then privatized. At the same time it was going from undersupply to oversupply. I thought it was a pretty good business because demand always exceeded supply. When I came in that was changing, and I had a good feeling of what had to be done.”
Wright’s next challenge will be serving as CEO of Scientific Games, the world’s largest operator of lotteries. He has been a member of the company’s board since 2004. “A brilliant entrepreneur formed the company. He will still be there and hopefully with me for a long time,” says Wright. “I’m going to be able to work with him in putting management systems in the company that he built project-by-project and country-by-country. It’s not that different from the situation at PanAmSat, which was built satellite-by-satellite and market-by-market. It’s pretty much the same situation except the we’re not facing a $1.9 billion debt repayment in six months as was the situation when I first came to PanAmSat in 2001. This will be a lot of fun.”
Wright discusses his time in the satellite industry with Via Satellite Editor Jason Bates.
Email
Comments
Print
Reuse
Archives
Copyright Permissions
