[walrus01]

Iridium wasn't a sell-off. Motorola was one of the largest investors in Iridium, and lost a vast amount of money when it went bankrupt. Additionally they were deeply involved in its hardware.

The second incarnation of the Iridium corporation we know now is the group of people who bought it at pennies on the dollar in the bankruptcy auction.

[OldHand2018]

Iridium went under because the developing world installed mobile networks, and Motorola had a huge portion of that market.

Accounting tricks aside, they didn't lose money on the downfall.

[ppg677]

Iridium was doomed from day 1. The system could only support a small number of subscribers. It was nearly impossible to recoup the capital expenditures given the capacity of the system.