SPOT Satellite Messenger Wins 2008 WSJ Technology Innovation Award – Globalcom
SPOT Satellite Messenger Wins 2008 WSJ Technology Innovation Award
The subsidiary company of Globalstar Inc., SPOT LLC, has received the prestigious 2008 Wall Street Journal Technology Innovation Award for the SPOT Satellite Messenger. The innovative handheld satellite-based personal safety, messaging and tracking device was named this year’s winner of the Consumer Electronics category.
Since its introduction in November of 2007, this marks the sixth industry award for the SPOT Satellite Messenger and Tracker. More than 700 entries were received by the Wall Street Journal to be considered for the Innovation Awards. Judges looked for innovations that broke new ground in their field and demonstrated a measurable impact. Only four percent of the entries received the final award in 19 different categories.
The SPOT Satellite Messenger and Tracker was designed as a means of communication to increase safety in the outdoors virtually anywhere, even where cellular or satellite phone service is limited or non-existent. The SPOT uniquely combines GPS and simplex satellite technology, enabling users to stay in contact directly and reliably with friends, loved ones and emergency responders from virtually anywhere around the globe – even in most remote locations – independent of cell phone or satellite phone coverage. SPOT is battery-operated (two AA lithium batteries), rugged, and waterproof, and allows users to send satellite text and email messages for help, or to check-in and inform loved ones that they are out of harms way. In an emergency, SPOT will notify GEOS, an international emergency response center used to dispatch local rescue authorities to the SPOT user’s GPS location.
Tens of thousands of people around the world – from soccer moms, to outdoor adventurers, to flying enthusiasts and transportation companies, are using the SPOT Satellite Messenger and Tracker to stay in touch and track the GPS locations of family members, co-workers and friends.
SPOT has established itself as an everyday lifestyle product that is a “must have” in today’s ever changing environment.