How To Live Up to the Innovation Hype
"Yeah, Iridium isn't around any more. It went bankrupt in 2000," one of the museum-goers said as he looked at a display of an Iridium satellite. Desch wanted to tell the men that Iridium is actually still around after private investors resurrected it in 2001 and that the company saw $212 million in sales and $54 million in profits in 2006.
Desch walked closer to the display and discovered why the men were misinformed about Iridium's current profitable state. The plaque beside the satellite read like an obituary, declaring Iridium's life span from 1999 to 2000. According to the sign, Iridium -- initially funded by Motorola in 1998 to an avalanche of publicity -- was kaput, after going bankrupt when the phones failed to catch on with consumers. To Desch's dismay, the museum sign had no information about the company's subsequent resurrection and current success.
"Iridium had such a public failure and a private success later. Failure looms as the biggest thing that happened to us," says Desch, who joined the company in 2006. But Iridium, based in Bethesda, Md., is now growing, with increases in revenues, profits, and other metrics such as rising user numbers in new markets, like military, disaster relief, aviation, and utilities. Iridium's service has 180,000 subscribers, and those numbers are growing at a rate of 15% to 20% per year.
Other "Next Big Thing" companies that, like Iridium,...