April 15, 2010 (FinancialWire) — Iridium Communications Inc. (NASDAQ: IRDM) has appointed S. Scott Smith to the role of executive vice president for Iridium NEXT, the company's next generation satellite constellation program.

Lee Demitry, the company's current executive vice president for Iridium NEXT, recently announced his resignation to return to his own consulting practice.

Smith joins Iridium from DigitalGlobe Inc., a commercial remote sensing satellite company, where he has served as chief operating officer since 2005. In this role, he oversaw the company's operations and engineering organizations; production strategy; satellite commissioning and ground systems; and the company's global expansion of its direct access business. During his tenure, he led development and operations for WorldView-1 and WorldView-2, the world's most sophisticated high resolution imaging satellites, which were launched in 2007 and 2009 respectively.

Smith holds a bachelor of science degree in aerospace engineering from Syracuse University and master of science degree in aeronautical/astronautical engineering from Stanford University.

Iridium NEXT is an intensive, multi-year design and development program that began in 2006 for purposes of developing the next generation Iridium satellite constellation.

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