Lightsquared misses $56.25m payment to Inmarsat

US carrier Lightsquared’s fortunes are going from bad to worse, as satellite firm Inmarsat has told the London Stock Exchange that it has not received a payment of $56.25m from the company.

Lightsquared has now received a notice of default in accordance with the terms of the agreement, said Inmarsat, and has a period of 60 calendar days to make the payment.

Until now, Lightsquared has been making scheduled payments for work conducted by Inmarsat at various milestones in the two firms’ work together. The $56.25m payment was due upon the completion of “Phase 1 transition”. Although this has now been completed, the payment has not been received.

Inmarsat claims that if it does not receive the payment within the specified timeframe, it is entitled to enforce its rights and remedies under the agreement of payment default. This includes invoking the termination of some of Lightsquared’s rights under the cooperation agreement.

Lightsquared received a hammer blow last week, after the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced that it plans to indefinitely suspend a conditional waiver that would allow US carrier LightSquared to build a ground-based LTE network using satellite spectrum.

The FCC made the decision following a recommendation from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), which found that the operator’s mobile broadband network would impact GPS services to such an extent that it would be no practical way to mitigate the potential interference.

Inmarsat added that it and LightSquared have entered into discussions regarding the future of the Cooperation Agreement. The saltellite firm added that its revenue from its core mobile satellite business remains unaffected by the announcement.