Walter C. Anderson (born 1953) is an American entrepreneur, investor, and advocate for commercial space travel. He began his career in telecommunications and founded several companies including Mid-Atlantic Telecom in 1984 and Esprit Telecom in 1992, which were acquired by

Frontier Communications Frontier Communications Parent, Inc. (known as Citizens Utilities Company until May 2000 and Citizens Communications Company until July 31, 2008) is an American telecommunications company. The company previously served primarily rural areas and s ...

and Global TeleSystems Group, respectively. He co-founded the

International Space University The International Space University (ISU) is dedicated to the discovery, research, and development of outer space and its applications for peaceful purposes, through international and multidisciplinary education and research programs. ISU was f ...

and provided financial support for the

Space Frontier Foundation The Space Frontier Foundation is an American space advocacy nonprofit corporation organized to promote the interests of increased involvement of the private sector, in collaboration with government, in the exploration and development of space. I ...

during its creation. Anderson also invested in a number of space ventures including

Rotary Rocket Rotary Rocket Company was an aerospace company in the late 1990s. Its founders were among the first to recognize that the end of the Cold War represented a significant shift away from the militarization of space, to a new civilian-led, commercia ...

, a company that attempted to develop a reusable, single-stage launch vehicle with the aid of helicopter rotors. He founded MirCorp, an unsuccessful venture to privatize the

Mir ''Mir'' (russian: Мир, ; ) was a space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, operated by the Soviet Union and later by Russia. ''Mir'' was the first modular space station and was assembled in orbit from 1986 to&n ...

space station, and Orbital Recovery Corporation, a company developing technology to capture and repair telecommunication satellites. In the mid 2000s, Anderson pled guilty to charges of tax evasion and was sentenced to nine years in prison. After his release in 2012, he founded Avealto a company developing a fleet of high-altitude platforms.

Early life

Walter C. Anderson was born Walter Anderson Crump in 1953. He grew up in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

Career

Anderson began his career in the telecommunications industry at

MCI Communications MCI Communications Corp. (originally Microwave Communications, Inc.) was a telecommunications company headquartered in Washington, D.C. that was at one point the second-largest long-distance provider in the United States. MCI was instrument ...

in 1979. He founded Mid-Atlantic Telecom in 1984. Mid-Atlantic Telecom was a long-distance telephone service carrier. The company was the first to combine telephone and voicemail services. Anderson served as president and chairman of the Mid-Atlantic Telecom until the early 1990s when the company was acquired by Rochester Telephone Corporation (now

). In 1988, Anderson co-founded the

as an early investor. He provided financial support for the

during its creation in 1991. The following year, he founded Esprit Telecom based in London, taking advantage of early telecom deregulation in the U.K. Anderson served as chairman of the company until November 1998. The following month, Global TeleSystems Group, a US publicly traded company, acquired Esprit for nearly $1 billion. Anderson was also a major shareholder of Telco Communications Group before its acquisition by

Excel Communications Excel Communications is a now defunct multi-level marketing (MLM) telecommunications company that was at one point America's fifth largest long-distance carrier after AT&T, MCI, Sprint, and Worldcom. Company history Excel was founded in 1988 ...

for $1.2 billion. In the mid to late 1990s, Anderson was an early investor in Erol's Internet, which expanded into one of the largest dial-up ISPs. Erol's was acquired by

RCN Corporation RCN Corporation, originally Residential Communications Network, founded in 1993 and based in Princeton, New Jersey, was the first American facilities-based ("overbuild") provider of bundled telephone, cable television, and internet service del ...

in 1998, netting Anderson stock in RCN worth $25 million. The same year, Anderson became chairman of Worldxchange Communications. He served in the position until December 2000 when the company was sold to World Access. He also served as chairman of Covista Communications from 1999 to 2001. Anderson had been an ardent supporter of the development of commercial space activities. He was an early-stage investor in many private space ventures in the 1990s and early 2000s, and one of the first "astropreneurs". His highest-profile space investment was MirCorp, the late 1990s start-up that briefly privatized Russia's aging

space station. He reportedly invested as much as $30 million into the venture. From 1996 and 1999, Anderson was also an investor in

, a now-defunct venture to develop a reusable

single-stage-to-orbit A single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) vehicle reaches orbit from the surface of a body using only propellants and fluids and without expending tanks, engines, or other major hardware. The term usually, but not exclusively, refers to reusable vehicles ...

crewed

spacecraft A spacecraft is a vehicle or machine designed to fly in outer space. A type of artificial satellite, spacecraft are used for a variety of purposes, including communications, Earth observation, meteorology, navigation, space colonization, p ...

that hoped to combine the rotors of a helicopter with rocketry to achieve orbit. In the early 2000s, Anderson also founded and served as CEO of Orbital Recovery Corporation, a company developing technology to capture and repair telecommunication satellites. In the mid 2000s, he was accused of not reporting income from investments in non-US companies. Anderson was arrested on February 26, 2005, at

Dulles International Airport Washington Dulles International Airport , typically referred to as Dulles International Airport, Dulles Airport, Washington Dulles, or simply Dulles ( ), is an international airport in the Eastern United States, located in Loudoun County and Fai ...

as he was returning from

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. He was held in the Washington, D.C. jail for more than 2 years, before he pled guilty to some of the charges against him in September 2006. He was sentenced to nine years in prison in March 2007. In June 2007, federal district judge

Paul L. Friedman Paul L. Friedman (born February 20, 1944) is a senior United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. He serves as secretary of the American Law Institute. Education and career Friedman was born i ...

ruled that Anderson would not have to pay any restitution to the

federal government A federation (also known as a federal state) is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a central federal government (federalism). In a federation, the self-governin ...

due to a

typographical error A typographical error (often shortened to typo), also called a misprint, is a mistake (such as a spelling mistake) made in the typing of printed (or electronic) material. Historically, this referred to mistakes in manual type-setting (typography). ...

by the government in the plea agreement but Anderson would still have to pay restitution to the District of Columbia government. Anderson was released at the end of 2012 after serving the last few months of his term at home in Virginia. In September 2007, Anderson was named by the New Scientist as one of the "Top 10 Influential Space Thinkers". He was also featured in ''

Orphans of Apollo ''Orphans of Apollo'' is a 2008 documentary film directed and produced by Michael Potter, co-directed by Becky Neiman and edited by Todd Jones, which describes how a band of entrepreneurs tried to privatize the space station Mir and tells the stor ...

'', a documentary about MirCorp. In 2013, Anderson founded Avealto Ltd., based in the UK. Avealto was founded to finance, construct and operate a fleet of high-altitude platforms. Since then, the company has gained an airworthiness certification for the FAA for a 28-meter-long test vehicle. The final design developed by Anderson and co-founder David Chambers is a 100-meter-long helium airship with a payload of telecommunications equipment. The airship would float in a stationary position guided by GPS tracking.

References

External links

About Walt Anderson
on the Avealto website {{DEFAULTSORT:Anderson, Walter American telecommunications industry businesspeople Businesspeople from Washington, D.C. 1953 births Living people American businesspeople convicted of crimes American people convicted of tax crimes