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Orbiting Wall Street

By Staff Writer | May 21, 2007

Intelsat

Intelsat Ltd. reported revenue growth of 85 percent in the first quarter of 2007 but posted a loss of $115.1 million due to the acquisition of PanAmSat, Intelsat announced May 14.

Total revenue first three months of 2007 was $518.2 million, up from $280.4 million in the same period in 2006. The operations of PanAmSat contributed about $215.6 million to the increase, including $18.3 million for operations by the G2 Satellite Solutions government business sold to Intelsat General.

Intelsat cited increased sales of transponder services and managed solutions for revenue increases generated by existing and new customers in Africa, the Middle East and North America.

CEO David McGlade said company’s "continued strong revenue backlog of $8.1 billion provides solid evidence of the predictability of our future revenue streams."

Globalstar

Globalstar Inc. reported revenues of $23.2 million in the 2007 first quarter, down from $30.3 million in the same period a year ago, the company announced May 14.

Service revenue was $17.5 million in the first three months of 2007, down from $20.7 million in the 206 first quarter, while subscriber equipment sales slipped from $9.6 million to $5.7 million over the same period.

Globalstar posted a profit of $400,000 in the 2007 first quarter, down from $21.4 million a year ago, which included an $18.8 million tax benefit.

Globalstar closed the first quarter of 2007 with about 272,000 total subscribers, an increase of about 10 percent from the end of the 2006 first quarter. Globalstar added about 8,800 net new subscribers during the quarter.

In February, Globalstar warned customers that its satellite constellation is plagued by degraded performance and service loss could begin as early as next year.

"Despite a difficult quarter which included a number of technical challenges while dealing with negative competitive marketing and sales tactics, we continued to show subscriber growth and decreased monthly churn," Jay Monroe, chairman and CEO of Globalstar, said in a statement. "The service issues related to the realignment of our constellation that occurred during the quarter and the new concerns about the service life of our satellites had a negative impact on our customers and distributors. As a result, we experienced quarterly decreases in net income, adjusted EBITDA and service revenue."

Motorola, Modulus Video

Motorola Inc. signed an agreement to acquire Modulus Video Inc., the companies announced May 17.

Modulus, a privately held company based in Sunnyvale, Calif., provides (compression systems used to deliver video content in the IPTV, cable, broadcast and satellite marketplace. Modulus Video has partnered with Motorola for more than two years to develop encoding solutions for customers around the globe.

Modulus will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Motorola and be integrated into the Motorola Home & Networks Mobility business.

Terms of the transaction, which is expected to be completed in no later than the third quarter, were not disclosed.

Helius, PointeCast

Helius Inc. signed a definitive agreement to acquire PointeCast Corp., a global of communication and online training solutions, Helius announced May 16.

The acquisition of PointeCast’s product lines will add rapid content authoring tools to Helius’ offerings. Details of the agreement were not released.

Norsat

Norsat International Inc. reported first quarter earnings of $540,000 on revenues of $4.4 million, posting a profit for the second consecutive quarter, the company announced May 15. In the 2006 first quarter, Norsat lost $1.8 million on revenues of $2.9 million.

The company credited the improvement to the introduction of new products and buoyant sales in both business units. In the 2007 first quarter, the company’s satellite systems unit generated $2.7 million in revenues, while the microwave products unit posted revenues of $1.7 million. For the same period a year ago, sales of satellite systems and microwave products totaled $1.9 million and $1 million, respectively.

Thales

Thales reported a revenue increase of nearly 7 percent in the 2007 first quarter to 2.2 billion euros ($3 billion), the company announced May 15. The majority of revenues were generated by the defense business, which contributed more than 1 billion euros ($1.4 million) in the quarter.

Canal+ France

Canal+ France ended March with 5.2 million subscribers, an increase of about 200,000 compared to the combined Canalsat/TPS numbers from the same quarter of 2006. The two platforms were combined in 2006 by Vivendi Universal.

Revenues from pay-TV operations were up nearly 25 percent from the 2006 first quarter, with the uptick had been driven by the acquisition.

Canal+ Group had a strong quarter, reporting revenues of 1.1 billion euros ($1.5 billion), an increase of more than 18 percent compared to the same quarter a year ago.