Word: comsat
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...situation was unusual, so is the firm that Johnson spoke of. It has little money, only 53 employees, and an ivy-covered mansion in Washington for its headquarters-where its president's office is the master bedroom. Comsat is unique in more important respects: it is a privately owned, Governmentsheltered monopoly that hopes to become a billion-dollar corporation. Its aim: to girdle the world with communications satellites capable of relaying telephone, telegraph, TV and facsimile signals between practically any two points on earth...
Tortured Compromise. Ever since Congress approved Comsat's formation in 1962, after a bitter battle between the champions of Government ownership and private-business control, the corporation has spent most of its time laying the groundwork for action. Last week that action began on several fronts...
...Washington, six big U.S. firms submitted proposals for four possible satellite designs for Comsat to choose from. The six: A.T. & T. and RCA acting jointly, I.T. & T. and Thompson Ramo Wooldridge, Hughes Aircraft, and Ford's Philco subsidiary. In Rome at a meeting with top Comsat officers, skeptical European officials were finally convinced that the company was moving ahead so rapidly that they should work along with it-or see the U.S. monopolize space communications. In about two months, Comsat will put $200 million worth of its stock on sale; with the capital it raises, it will start experiments...
...Comsat is a somewhat tortured compromise between private and Government interests. Half of its stock, which will start out at $100 per share, will be sold to "common carriers," varying from giant A.T. & T. to the Rochester Telephone Co., the rest to the public. The 15-man board will consist of six members from the communications companies, six from the public, and three named by the President. Comsat will be run by its $125,000-a-year chairman and chief executive officer, Leo D. Welch, 65, former Jersey Standard chairman, and its $80,000-a-year president, Dr. Joseph...