Another Dutch company Seer didn't mention is
New Skies Satellites NV. This company was started in 1998 under a privatization ruling for Intelsat (Gov't funded), in which New Skies became a spin-off company. Eutelsat and Inmarsat are under the same ruling and have privatized as well. The privatization of the telecommunications industry (at least where the telecommunications satellite industry is concerned) was pushed to the private sector during the later years in Ronald Reagan's administration (late 80s). Orion Network Systems (now owned by Loral/Cyberstar) became one of the first privately held satellite companies in the US and Europe with a collaboration between various companies in the US and Europe including Matra Marconi and British Aerospace. There is bookoos of information on this small area of the telecommunications industry and should be easily found on the web. I hope this will help inspire her :-)
Good luck!
