Countdown to Launch: Lockheed Martin Makes Final Preparations for DigitalGlobe's WorldView-4 Earth Imaging Satellite

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Jul 13, 2016, 06:00 ET

SUNNYVALE, Calif., July 13, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Final preparations are underway at Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) to ship DigitalGlobe's (NYSE:DGI) WorldView-4 earth imaging satellite to Vandenberg Air Force Base for a Sept. 15 launch.

The Lockheed Martin team is completing final satellite testing and checkout before shipment. Testing includes calculating the weight and center of gravity of WorldView-4, completing a health check of major systems, and testing out image collection and downlinking capability.

"The high resolution and high accuracy images taken by WorldView-4 will support DigitalGlobe's worldwide customer base," said Carl Marchetto, vice president and general manager of Lockheed Martin Commercial Space. "DigitalGlobe's smart imagery serves hundreds of thousands of end-users charged with the safety and security of nations, and enables the maps and geospatial applications relied on by billions of consumers."

"Only the DigitalGlobe constellation, with the addition of WorldView-4, offers the highest quality, and most comprehensive global coverage of our changing planet through 2030, so our customers can be confident they will have the information to make critical decisions," said Dr. Walter Scott, Founder and Chief Technology Officer, DigitalGlobe. "WorldView-4 will help us continue to transform the way we see the world, and advance our mission of keeping our planet and its people safe and secure."

Once launched, WorldView-4 will double DigitalGlobe's coverage of the world's highest resolution imagery and increase the rate at which it grows its 15-year library of time-lapse high-resolution imagery. WorldView-4 will orbit Earth every 90 minutes, traveling 17,000 miles per hour and capturing more 680,000 square kilometers of the Earth's surface daily (19.5 terabytes) the equivalent of the land area of Texas.

With an orbit approximately 400 miles from Earth, the satellite will be launched aboard a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket provided by Lockheed Martin Commercial Launch Services.

For additional information, visit our website: http://www.lockheedmartin.com/commercialspace.

About Lockheed Martin
Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin is a global security and aerospace company that – with the addition of Sikorsky – employs approximately 126,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services.

About DigitalGlobe
DigitalGlobe is a leading provider of commercial high-resolution earth observation and advanced geospatial solutions that help decision makers better understand our changing planet in order to save lives, resources and time. Sourced from the world's leading constellation, our imagery solutions deliver unmatched coverage and capacity to meet our customers' most demanding mission requirements. Each day customers in defense and intelligence, public safety, civil agencies, map making and analysis, environmental monitoring, oil and gas exploration, infrastructure management, navigation technology, and providers of location-based services depend on DigitalGlobe data, information, technology and expertise to gain actionable insight.

Special note about forward-looking statements

Certain statements contained herein, including statements about our 2016 outlook, contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as amended. Forward-looking statements relate to future events or future financial performance. We generally identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as "may," "will," "should," "expects," "plans," "anticipates," "could," "intends," "target," "projects," "contemplates," "believes," "estimates," "predicts," "potential," "continue" or "looks forward to" or the negative of these terms or other similar words, although not all forward-looking statements contain these words.

Forward-looking statements are based upon our current expectations and assumptions of future events and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results or performance to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements. Some of the risk and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ include, but are not limited to: the loss or reduction in scope of any of our primary contracts, or decisions by customers not to exercise renewal options; the availability of government funding for our products and services both domestically and internationally; our ability to meet our obligations under the EnhancedView contract; our reliance on a limited number of vendors to provide certain key products or services to us; breach of our system security measures or loss of our secure facility clearance and accreditation; the loss or damage to any of our satellites; delays in the construction and launch of any of our satellites or our ability to achieve and maintain full operational capacity of all our satellites; loss or damage to the content contained in our ImageLibrary; interruption or failure of our ground systems and other infrastructure; decrease in demand for our imagery products and services; increased competition that may reduce our market share or cause us to lower our prices; changes in political or economic conditions, including fluctuations in the value of foreign currencies, interest rates, energy and commodity prices, trade laws and the effects of governmental initiatives to manage economic conditions; our ability to recruit, hire or retain key employees or a highly skilled and diverse workforce; failure to obtain or maintain required regulatory approvals and licenses; and, changes in U.S. or foreign law or regulation that may limit our ability to distribute our imagery products and services. Additional information concerning these and other risk factors can be found in our filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2015.

We undertake no obligation to revise or update any forward-looking statements, except as required by law. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any of these forward-looking statements.

Media Contact:
Lockheed Martin: Jill Krugman, +1 303-947-2930; [email protected]

Edelman for DigitalGlobe, David Whiting, +1 212-277-3803, [email protected]

SOURCE Lockheed Martin