Aramiska bought by Davoudian Industries, Swiss satellite broadband Satelnet and private investors
BREAKING NEWS: ARAMISKA RISES FROM THE ASHES

Rockville, MD - Feb. 16, 2006 Like a phoenix rising from the ashes satellite, broadband house Aramiska - which shut down operations three weeks ago after giving customers fewer than seven hours notice - has flickered back to life with new owners, new management and a new business plan. As of this morning, the first 1,000 customers had gotten their broadband back, Aramiska's new CEO Michel Davoudian told TelecomWeb news break in an exclusive interview. During the past 24 hours, Davoudian says, Aramiska's network has been quietly brought back into operation, and its network operation center is now fully functional once again. "We turned the system on in only a few hours, which is quite fantastic," he tells Telecom news break editor Stuart Zipper. Now customers need only reboot their modems to regain their satellite broadband and "or big customers now are switching on again," he adds.
TelecomWeb news break was chosen as the exclusive publication to relay Aramiska's return to the broadband marketplace because of its relentless coverage of the network shutdown and its subsequent business complications. "Most people walk away from a story or company when they think it is dead and gone. That's lousy journalism," says Zipper/ "You always have to keep your eyes open to what will be happening next."

Davoudian says Aramiska employees have begun returning to the company, with about 15 people back on the job as of today and others expected to return in the near future. Despite being a major player in the European satellite broadband market, companies like Aramiska don't need an awful lot of employees. For now, Davoudian foresees a total staff of between 20 and 25. None of Aramiska's executives are being invited back, he adds: "I didn't take any of them. I changed everything. We have new management." Davoudian is the driving force behind a group he says outbid Eutelsat last week for ownership of the assets of Aramiska - a quiet (one might say secret) and unreported auction involving the bankruptcy courts in Belgium and Holland. The group, which has given itself the name Ouranos Networks - although for now it will continue to use the Aramiska brand name for its satellite broadband - includes Davoudian's private investment house Davoudian Industries, Swiss satellite broadband reseller Satelnet and a group of private investors. Davoudian, who is also the directeur général of pan-European systems integrator and reseller Group Infodis, technically holds the title of "Administrator Delegate" at Ouranos-Aramiska, an appellation dictated by the bankruptcy courts. But what it means, he says, is simply that he's "the new boss" - for all intents and purposes, the CEO.
With the re-launch of Aramiska, Davoudian gave TelecomWeb news break the first inside look at what happened at Aramiska when it shut down operations with essentially no notice to its customers (TelecomWeb news break, Jan. 27). It turns out that Eutelsat had been negotiating with Aramiska for a long time. According to Davoudian, "I don't know why the discussions broke down after a few months." What he does know is that "Aramiska had a lot of debt" (the Ouranos purchase did not include taking over any of Aramiska's debt). Just how much debt is still not clear, but the situation was not getting better. With the breakdown of talks with Eutelsat, Aramiska's owner - Connecticut venture capital house Whitney & Co. - apparently didn't want to invest another nickel, so it simply pulled the plug and Aramiska went down the drain. It's also not clear just how much Whitney put into Aramiska over the years, but Davoudian says the total was "tens of millions of euros," of which it now looks like most or probably all has been lost.
With Aramiska's operations shut down, and with its customers left high and dry with no broadband, "we had only a very, very short time to react," Davoudian says. "When you cut the service, every day the customers are going somewhere else. Every day the value (of the company) is going down."
Aramiska formally filed for bankruptcy Jan. 30 in courts in Belgium and Holland. Meanwhile, Satelnet's executives told Davoudian of the situation, and the group started coalescing. With no publicity, it went to the courts with its offer and, as it turns out, Eutelsat was doing the same thing. Fortunately, Davoudian says, "Belgium and Holland have judiciary systems that understood the emergency" - that if it took too long to approve a sale of Aramiska, there would be nothing left worth selling.
Davoudian won't reveal the size of the winning Ouranos bid, saying only "it's not one euro," adding "some people though they would be able to buy it at that price." In any case, the cash for the winning bid was paid to the bankruptcy courts this past Monday, and the call went out to former Aramiska employees to come back to work. "We are taking back all those who want to come back," he says (except, of course, the executives), adding that almost all are returning to the company, despite most having received multiple job offers from competing companies.
The first order of business, of course, is to get customers turned back on. Inevitably, Davoudian says, some will have been lost forever. "We made our plan thinking we will be recovering between 50 percent and 70 percent of the customers," he says. Davoudian also notes that it's not all that easy for Aramiska customers to simply switch to other satellite providers because of the need to install new antennas; the lead times involved in such installation; and, of course, the reluctance of customers to shell out as much as $2,500 for new hardware. Davoudian also has a message for former Aramiska customers: "Our will is not just to make a good deal by buying a company that was bankrupt. Aramiska software and service is far better than the others you can find on the market. You put two computers next to each other and you see the difference. You don't have to be a technician."
With at least 1,000 lines up as of this morning, it also now looks like there's a chance the company will do even better than it expected in regaining customers. One problem is that nobody seems to know exactly how many customers Aramiska had - the belief is that it's in the 2,500 range. But "it's not so clear," Davoudian says. "Many thing were not very clear" about Aramiska's operations, he says, adding, this also caused the bankruptcy."
Looking to the future, Davoudian says his plan is to start targeting Aramiska services at areas other than Western Europe, which has been its only market until now. "One of our new goals is to develop the business in the Eastern countries," he says. "The business in Europe for satellite will not develop much." As for the choice of the name "Ouranos" for the company created to buy Aramiska: In Greek mythology, Ouranos was the "primeval god" of the solid dome of the sky, and "the sky supports our network," Davoudian explains.
Besides which, he says, "in every language, you can pronounce Ouranos without a problem."

Liedekerke (Belgium), 15th February 2006

OURANOS NETWORKS are happy to announce that they have taken over the activities of former Aramiska. The new financing capitals are issued of the world of industry.
The network is just being brought back in operations and in order to restart your service no modification and no additional costs will be required. You only need to reboot your CPE units at your premises.
We will contact you in the next days to handle all other practical aspects.
We would like to thank you for the trust you're giving us. We are at your disposal for any question you might have on the following email
address: its-on@ouranos-networks.net - www.aramiska.net

The new Ouranos-Networks Team

Liedekerke (Belgique), 15 fevrier 2006

OURANOS NETWORKS est très heureux de vous annoncer dès aujourd'hui, la reprise des activités d'Aramiska. Le capital est désormais constituée d'un pool d'actionnaires privés issus du monde industriel.
Le réseau est d'ores et déjà opérationnel, la réactivation du service ne nécessite aucune modification technique de vos installations et n'engage aucun frais de mise en service. Vous ne devez que redemarrer vos équipements.
Nous vous contacterons dans les prochains jours pour aborder les autres aspects pratiques.
Nous vous remercions pour la confiance que vous nous accordez et restons à votre disposition pour tout complément d'information par mail its-on@ouranos-networks.net - www.aramiska.net

La nouvelle équipe d'Ouranos-Networks.

Liedekerke (Belgica), 15 de febrero de 2005

OURANOS NETWORKS es feliz de comunicarles que a partir de hoy ha
reanudado las actividades de Aramiska gracias a capitales del mundo
de la industria.
Le network acaba de ser reconectado y el servicio sera`disponible a
partir de hoy mismo y no seran necesarios ningun cambios de ningun
tipo: solamente poner en marcha los equipos que les fueron instalados
de Aramiska.
En quanto antes les contactaremos para actualizar los aspectos
practicos y contractuales.
Les agradecemos de antemano la confianza que nos han otorgado y
quedamos a disposicion para cualquier informacion necesiten al mail:
its-on@ouranos-networks.net - www.aramiska.net
El nuevo equipo humano de Ourano Netrworks

Liedekerke (Belgio), 15 febbraio 2006

OURANOS NETWORKS e' orgogliosa di annunciare che a partire da oggi ha ripreso le attività della ex-Aramiska grazie a capitali forniti dal mondo dell'industria.
La rete e' da poco nuovamente in funzione e per ripristinare il servizio non saranno necessarie ne' modifiche tecniche ne costi addizionali ma semplicemente far ripartire gli apparati installati presso di Voi.
Ci metteremo in contatto con Voi al più presto per discutere tutti gli aspetti pratici e contrattuali.
Vi ringraziamo per la fiducia e restiamo a Vostra disposizione per qualsiasi informazione aggiuntiva possiaTe aver bisogno all'indirizzo email:
its-on@ouranos-networks.net - www.aramiska.net
Il nuovo team di Ouranos-Networks.