Soyuz-2 carrier rocket with 6 US satellites launched from Baikonur

MOSCOW, July 13 (Itar-Tass) - The Soyuz-2 carrier rocket was launched
from the Baikonur cosmodrome on Wednesday. It will orbit six American
communications satellites of the Globalstar system.
"The launch of the carrier rocket equipped with the Fregat upper stage
was made at 06:27 MSK," head of the press service of the Federal Space
Agency (Roskosmos) Alexei Kuznetsov told Itar-Tass.
The modernised three-stage liquid-propelled middle-class rocket
carrier Soyuz-2 of the 1a of modernisation stage was designed and
manufactured at the Samara-based State Research and Production
Rocket-Space Centre TsSKB-Progress, and the Fregat upper stage - at the
NPO Lavochkin Research and Production Association.
The feature of this launch is that it was made from 31st launch site
of Baikonur - a standby pad of the Gagarin launch site.
The Globalstar system is designed to provide high quality mobile
communications services for a wide range of users. It is the only
satellite communications systems in the Russian territory that offers a
federal number, allowing the subscriber to easily get to the satellite
phone. Its regular orbital constellation includes 48 low-orbit main and
eight backup satellites. The advantage of the use of low-orbit
communications satellites is the minimum delay of the transmitted signal.
Globalstar is a low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation for
satellite phone and low-speed data communications, somewhat similar to the
Iridium satellite constellation and Orbcomm satellite systems. The
Globalstar project was launched in 1991 as a joint venture of Loral
Corporation and Qualcomm. On March 24, 1994, the two sponsors announced
formation of Globalstar LP, a limited partnership established in the U.S.,
with financial participation from eight other companies, including
Alcatel, AirTouch, Deutsche Aerospace, Hyundai and Vodafone. At that time,
the company predicted the system would launch in 1998, based on an
investment of $1.8 billion.
With over 315,000 subscribers (as of June 2008), Globalstar is the
world's largest provider of mobile satellite voice and data services.
Globalstar offers these services to commercial and recreational users in
more than 120 countries around the world. The Company's products include
mobile and fixed satellite telephones, simplex and duplex satellite data
modems and satellite airtime packages. In late 2007 Globalstar subsidiary
SPOT LLC launched a handheld satellite messaging and tracking personal
safety device known as the SPOT Satellite Messenger.
Currently, the Globalstar system is undergoing the process of
replacing the 1st generation satellites with the 2nd generation ones. The
first six Globalstar-2 satellites were launched from Baikonur on October
19, 2010.