Their product really had to be bleeding into the GPS bandwidth because this company's CEO is one of the ones pals.
The screwing around with GPS transmissions has serious national security implications as well as screwing around with my GPS golf, hunting, camping, fishing, navigation aid{s} is dangerous to their health.
It's better than that. Obama actually invested $95,000 in LightSquared in 2005, but sold it for a $13,000 loss eight months later.
One has to wonder if he was promised something "under the table".
Their product really had to be bleeding into the GPS bandwidth because this company's CEO is one of the ones pals.It is much, MUCH more a matter of the 'dynamic range' of just a ton of 'User Segment' gear (think: Garmins, Trimbles, Tom-Toms, and cell site reference receivers etc) than it is 'bleed-over' from the gear LightSquared was going to field ... engineers term or quantify it as the "3rd Order Intercept" (TOI) point".
Much more detail than I can give in one sitting can be found here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-order_intercept_point
The premise for years had been that the GPS spectrum was going to be protected ... that has been the basis upon which the engineering and 'link budgets' and dynamic-range requirements have been based.
... sure, a MUCH higher dynamic-range (and better IF filter for adjacent channel rejection of signals supplied to the demodulator) GPS receiver could be built, but at the expense not so much in dollars, but in size (additional higher-performance RF filters for instance) and battery consumption (higher Drain -current low-noise 1st RF amplifier stage and also a higher-LO injection mixer as well) ...