IRIDIUM Closer To Going Public, Again (GHL, GHQ)

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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Iridium Holdings is one step closer to coming public.  The special purpose acquisition company sponsored by Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE: GHL) has announced that the affiliate GHL Acquisition Corp. (NYSE: GHQ) has entered into agreements with certain holder of warrants that will hopefully be the last amended terms in the quest to bring the global satellite phone provider public.  Approximately 26.8 million warrants issued by GHL Acquisition, including 4 million warrants held by Greenhill, will be repurchased or restructured upon closing of its acquisition of Iridium Holdings LLC.

The warrants subject to these agreements and prior agreements represent approximately 69% of the 44.1 million GHL Acquisition warrants that would have been outstanding after the buyout of Iridium.

The goal here is to significantly reduce the number of fully diluted GHL Acquisition shares outstanding after the acquisition of Iridium is completed. This merger is still subject to FCC approval and subject to GHL Acquisition shareholder approval.

After today’s agreement and after prior agreements, Greenhill’s stake in GHL Acquisition after the merger will include approximately 6.9 million GHL Acquisition common shares received for founding GHL Acquisition and making an $8 million equity investment, approximately 1.9 million GHL Acquisition common shares resulting from conversion of its $22.9 million convertible note investment in Iridium, and 4 million GHL Acquisition warrants with an out-of-the-money strike prices.

More details about the shares and warrants on a post-merger basis can be seen in the company’s release.

GHL Acquisition expects that today’s agreement will be the last adjustment of valuation terms and other terms.  It currently expects that a shareholder vote on the Iridium buyout will take place in September 2009.  After this, Iridium will be a public satellite phone company… Again.

Jon C. Ogg
July 29, 2009

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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