GeoEye Celebrates GeoEye-1 Satellite's First Year

14 September 2009, 7:43pm

DULLES, Va., Sept. - GeoEye, Inc. (NASDAQ: GEOY), a premier provider of satellite and aerial-based geospatial information and services, marked the one-year launch anniversary of GeoEye-1, the world's highest resolution and most accurate commercial Earth-imaging satellite. The satellite was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California on September 6, 2008.

"The past year has been an exciting and rewarding one for GeoEye," said Bill Schuster, GeoEye's Chief Operating Officer. "With the launch of GeoEye-1 last September, we put into service the world's most advanced commercial imagery satellite, which is delivering the highest resolution, most accurate color satellite imagery available today."

In celebration of this Sept. 6 anniversary, GeoEye tasked the GeoEye-1 satellite to collect a half-meter resolution image of Madrid, Spain on Sept. 7. The full high-resolution image is featured on GeoEye's corporate home page at: www.geoeye.com, under "Featured Satellite Imagery," along with other stunning images including the 2009 Burning Man Festival, Black Rock Desert, Nevada; Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe; construction of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic venues, British Colombia; and San Francisco Bay in northern California.

Since its launch, GeoEye-1 has imaged every continent in the world and chronicled several noteworthy events this year, including President Obama's inauguration ceremony in Washington, D.C. in January. In April, GeoEye-1 photographed a North Korean missile facility just moments before the launch of a long-range missile. The GeoEye-1 satellite has collected approximately 54 million square kilometers of imagery and taken over 200,000 images since its launch.

"The strong partnership between GeoEye and General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems delivers tremendous value to our customers," said Dave Shingledecker, Vice President of Integrated Space Systems for General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems. "We are aligned in our commitment to the imagery market and possess complementary capabilities and business strategies. We have an exciting future as we work together to further enhance commercial imagery."

GeoEye began delivering GeoEye-1 imagery to Google Inc. for both the Google Earth and Google Maps services in March. A sample of images from GeoEye-1, including the Great Pyramid of Giza, Egypt; Borneo, Indonesia; Cabo Polonio, Uruguay; and British Columbia, Canada can be seen at the link below.

Plans are in development for GeoEye-2, another high-resolution satellite. GeoEye has contracted with ITT Corporation (NYSE: ITT) to build the GeoEye-2 high-resolution camera and electronics. ITT's work could be used to accelerate the development of GeoEye-2, so that it could begin commercial operations in 2013.

GeoEye-1 imagery to Google Inc.

GeoEye, Inc.

Geo: International