The rapidly growing international economy will witness within the decade the mass migration of traditional businesses to a new, active and vital presence in e-commerce, e-procurement, and business-to-business (B-to-B) exchange. E-business is moving more into mobile, wireless communications. A portion of this business can be addressed efficiently and cost-effectively by the new Little LEO narrowband systems now on the horizon. This is an important development for both industrialized and developing nations.

General Dynamics Information Systems provides information processing systems and information management services. Although our traditional focus has been government markets, we are developing stronger ties to commercial space and the expanding data information and e-business market-place.

General Dynamics comes to WRC-2000 as a strategic partner and equity investor in a Little LEO wireless data communications system and as a technology "insider" who knows how this industry is developing.

We come to Istanbul to make an appeal to the WRC delegates to keep the door opened for consideration of additional allocations for this important Little LEO industry (referred to as non-GSO MSS <1 GHz) and to prepare an agenda for WRC-2003 to include consideration of additional frequency allocations for the inevitable worldwide development of mass markets in low-cost wireless data services.

The amazing revolution in digital electronic information technology is re-ordering how people interact and connect with each other in personal and commercial transactions. This e-revolution is spawning vigorous waves of creative new tools to generate incredible productivity, efficiency, and wealth.

At this threshold of change, it has been estimated that there are about 100 million mobile Internet users active in the market-place. This represents about 30 per cent of the currently addressable market.

In 1999, General Dynamics acted on an opportunity to enter the commercial global wireless data market through an equity investment in Final Analysis Inc. who is building a Little LEO satellite constellation for wireless e-mail and computer file transfers in addition to many other messaging and data information applications.

We were selected by Final Analysis as its strategic partner for overall system engineering and integration and as prime contractor for the ground segment of its global FAISATsystem. We will also be supplying the command and data handling space processors for the system.

This new, modular processor is, we believe, an excellent example of an entry vehicle for the commercial satellite communications market and the emerging e-commerce environment. Based on commercial PowerPC technology, the processor is capable of throughput in the range of 450+ million instructions per second (MIPS).

Further, the controller uses a COTS VxWorks operating system and commercial software development environments. This configurable product can be custom installed to manage varying satellite communications requirements and provide important processing functions for differing types of e-commerce and many other applications.

General Dynamics has made a commitment to commercial space and telecommunications.Last year we joined ITU�s Telecommunication Development Sector (ITU-D) as a private Sector Member. We may be viewed at WRC-2000 as a "new player" but we are here for the long-term as commercial information management and e-commerce continues its rapid growth in global markets.

Practical Little LEO applications have been well explained and demonstrated by others. These systems not only work, but they are proving their capability to share frequencies with other users without interference. So far, WRCs have only allocated a small portion of spectrum to non-GSO MSS <1 GHz. There has not been a global allocation to this industry since WARC-92. However, the technology has greatly advanced over these eight years, facilitating an important niche for Little LEO systems in e-commerce and internet-related growth.