"ROBERT FRIEDLAND
THE MAN OF THE YEAR "

When I first met Mr. Friedland at the Carlysle Hotel in August, 1994, he was packaging his satellite radio idea, then called CD Radio. For three days we visited one institution after another with no encouragement. Our last visit was to the American diamond king Maurice Templesman. There is no question Mr. Friedland was disappointed. There was no backer for satellite radio in the U.S.

However, his fertile mind already centered around his Vancouver-based Diamond Field Resources and he invited me to Vancouver. Eventually, the Toronto-based First Marathon brought CD Radio public, and when I introduced him to the legendary Bernie Schwartz, Chairman of Loral Satellite, the idea was gaining recognition. There was a whole regimen of people larger than life who carried the idea further. Eventually there were 18 million subscribers in America for Satellite Radio, each paying $12.50 a month.

For whatever way we look at it, this remarkable achievement originated from a single man. Such audience which is the result of the proposed merger between Sirius Satellite and XM Radio, is history. Everybody in America knows about satellite radio. History will record the name of Robert Friedland following Mr. Bell and Mr. Edison.

Robert Friedland’s achievements in life are two-fold.

He lived in the Far East and he was certainly one of the individuals who has foreseen that the three billion new capitalists from the Far Eastern countries and the seven billion people on the whole globe, are going to gobble up commodities in a way it has never been done before. He has thought about china before most people. Actually, he told me that his biggest personal investment in the 1990s were 10 percent of a Chinese casino. He backed and set up and developed mining companies, whether nickel, copper, or gold, simply because he believed that the world is going to progress towards a peaceful living and the demand for commodities is going to increase exponentially.

The other achievement is surprisingly a different definition; it is numbers. Friedland always thought big. He conceived CD Radio and in the 1900s he raised about a billion dollars. Diamond Field Resources, of which he was co-chairman, was sold for $3 billion. Ivanhoe advertised with its partner, Rio Tinto, as a potential market capitalization of $15 billion.

But the numbers he will be remembered for, and which initiate this article, is the $11 billion, the combined value of Sirius Satellite and XM Radio. In about thirteen years, an idea which was simply logic not revolutionary development, his willpower carried to a level that it has a combined value of $11 billion. Surely there are going to be difficulties, the first being a multi-million billion-dollar debt and competition from other sources. But satellite communication is known in the automobile industry, it is known among common people, and it has entered the living rooms, such as mine in Southampton. It is the black and white television of the 21st century.

Friedland was one of the first people to recognize the immense natural resources of Mongolia, where he is currently negotiating to get a major project underway. Whatever way we look at it, it belongs to those people who stand against confrontations. Ivanhoe and Rio try to bring an agreement, a deal between equal parties. There is nothing to color it. Robert Friedland is the man of the year, a man for the 21st century.

He is in a way similar to George Soros, but he is not Hungarian. In the year 2007, he is likely to be named as the Man of the Year.

   Andrew Racz

(Article 48 - posted February 21, 2007)

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