The African Telecommunications Union (ATU) and Iridium Communications Inc. (Nasdaq:IRDM) today announced that Iridium has joined the ATU as an Associate Member. The new membership was marked by the awarding of a certificate by the ATU Secretary General Abdoulkarim Soumaila during the opening ceremony of the 1st ATU preparatory meeting for the World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC-19) today in Yaoundé, Cameroon. In his opening remarks, Mr. Soumaila said “Iridium has a long and honourable history serving Africa, and we are glad to be able to welcome them as ATU stakeholders”.
The ATU represents the interests of its Member States at global decision-making conferences and promotes initiatives aimed at integrating the region’s markets, attracting Information and Communication Technology (“ICT”) infrastructure investment, and building institutional and human capacity. Iridium becomes one of only 33 Associate Members of this policymaking body.
“Iridium is proud of its new membership in the leading telecommunications organization in Africa”, stated Thomas Hickey, chief legal officer for Iridium. “As a provider of connectivity across the African continent, we are very happy to be in a position formally to contribute to its important work over the years to come.”
As a new member of the ATU, Iridium will be engaging with the organization on preparations for International Telecommunication Union (ITU) conferences and assemblies. This includes the World Radiocommunication Conference in 2019, as well as satellite policies and other relevant matters.

About Africa Telecommunications Union
Founded in Kinshasa in 1977 as a specialized agency of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) now African Union (AU) in the field of telecommunications, ATU is the leading continental organization fostering developments of information and communications technologies infrastructure and services.
For nearly 33 years, ATU has coordinated the Regional positions in the International foras in relation to Standardization, Radio communication and Development of ICT. It brings together the most influential representatives of Government and Telecommunications and ICT Industry to exchange ideas, knowledge and experiences for the benefit of the continent.

About Iridium Communications Inc.
Iridium is the only mobile voice and data satellite communications network that spans the entire globe. Iridium enables connections between people, organizations and assets to and from anywhere, in real time. Together with its ecosystem of partner companies, Iridium delivers an innovative and rich portfolio of reliable solutions for markets that require truly global communications.

The company has a major development program underway for its next-generation network — Iridium NEXT. Iridium Communications Inc. is headquartered in McLean, Va., U.S.A., and its common stock trades on the NASDAQ Global Select Market under the ticker symbol IRDM. For more information about Iridium products, services and partner solutions, visit www.iridium.com.