In an effort to give a little something back to the military community while getting some use out of old inventory, World Communication Center began a program under which the company will be distributing free of charge first-generation Iridium satellite phones manufactured by Kyocera to military personnel deployed in the field.

The calling up of National Guard troops in Arizona (WCC is based in Chandler, Ariz.) triggered WCC to begin this promotion, WCC CEO Weldon Knape told Satellite News.

The company looked at its existing inventory of the first generation of Iridium phones and asked, “How can we make the most use of it?” Knape said. “We said, let’s just make these phones available to the troops. That was how it started.”

The promotion began snowballing from there. According to Knape, the company has issued about 50 to 75 phones so far.

“The momentum is building,” Knape added. “All we did was issue a press release (on Dec. 1) and from there it started to build up. Every day we get more phone calls on it” as the word of mouth of the promotion spreads. And while he did not say how many phones would be available to fulfill requests, Knape did say WCC has “a pretty good inventory of these phones.” He added that the promotion would last as long as the company has phones to offer soldiers.

And WCC has made it very simple in terms of getting the phones into the hands of those who may need it the most.

“Any military personnel that is assigned to a combat area is eligible,” Knape said. “We require verification of their military status and that’s really it. We expect them to purchase minutes from us, but we are giving them a free phone. It’s an incredibly simple program. The only request we make beyond that– and it is only a request– is that when they come back they give us the phone back so we can re-deploy it to someone else. It’s about as simple as you can get.” Knape added that pricing runs from about $1.00 to $1.40 per minute, depending on how many minutes are purchased at a given time. For more details on the promotion, contact WCC at 1-800-211-2575.

(Weldon Knape, WCC, 480-857-6656)