Analysts will examine the entrails of Iridium for years to come in order to understand all the reasons why this bird could not fly. There will be rich lessons for every field of management - finance, marketing, technology, operations, leadership and organization, and sales.　

　　The plate is full for marketers. But one point stands out as a consistent problem for Motorola, the Godfather of Iridium, and many engineering companies. They deeply believe that their company is made up of engineering, manufacture, advertising and sales. Marketing is seen as little more than advertising, and only a support for sales. What engineering creates is what the sales organization must sell. In no way is marketing, which always represents the needs and wants of customers, to influence strategy, product design or price; nor should it question the existing sales organization. As far as real marketing is concerned, Motorola, like Blanche Dubois in Streetcar Named Desire, has always has to depend on the kindness of strangers. The marketing skill of automakers built the fortune of Motorola's car radio. The marketing energy of mobile telecommunications carriers created the success of the company's handsets. When Motorola choose to market its own product to users, as in the case of television sets, it failed. In like manner Iridium had no one to carry the marketing water. Motorola is a great company for technological innovation, but it must always find a good marketer to shape its genius to the needs and wants of the customer public.

　　Iridium's business design doomed the project. Motorola reached out to regional investors who had sales organizations. Japanese, Korean, Venezuelan, and other regional investors were the gateway organizations responsible for marketing plans and sales. Product development was safely sequestered in Schaumburg, IL, and Iridium's Washington headquarters served as the political headquarters to handle government problems and PR hoopla in the U.S. and abroad. A multinational, multi-lingual board that resembled the United Nations governed the company. This was the architecture of a monopoly that did not fit the competitive telecommunications environment. There was no unit in this structure to represent the users who were supposed to buy this product. The WSJ reports that Edward Staiano, Chief Executive of Iridium, entered a meeting after the launch, carrying the ungainly apparatus and said, "You really expect business travelers to carry all this s---?"

　　With a $100 million advertising campaign, Iridium signed up 20,000 customers out of a projected sales estimate of 600,000. The handsets were too heavy and expensive. Airtime was exorbitant, voice quality was poor, and transmission was blocked by any object standing between the antenna and a satellite, like an office wall, the interior of a car, or just a tree. The device has no ubiquitous utility. It was good for mountain tops and the open sea.

　　By delegating marketing plans to regional gateways, Iridium eliminated marketing discipline from the business endeavor. Marketing discipline in any commercial venture must impact product design on the basis of customer research and competitive analysis. Marketing must charge a price based on the economic value in use to customers, rather than on a margin that excites shareholders. Marketing must determine distribution channels that will optimize maximize sales revenue, instead of rewarding investment partners with regional franchises that cannot deliver products to customers. The only marketing functions that Iridium deployed was advertising, which turned out to be more fanfare than value proposition.

　　Iridium did not delegate real marketing to the gateways, because they could not influence the 4 Ps of marketing. To their credit and although unheeded, many of them beseeched Iridium to postpone the launch because there was no viable sales strategy in place. The business design was typical of Motorola - an ensemble of technology, manufacturing, advertising and sales. Like its parent Motorola, Iridium could not subordinate technological artistry to marketing discipline.

　　Can Iridium be saved? Is it a good buy at $3 a share? Sample the 20,000 buyers. If they are using it and happy, then it is a good bet. There is always a chance that something can be done to save a useful enterprise? If they are not using it and not happy, then forget it. MK

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