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Orbital Completes Magellan-Ashtech Merger Dulles - Jan 7, 1998 - Orbital Sciences Corporation has completed its merger with Ashtech, Inc. of Sunnyvale, CA with its Magellan Corporation subsidiary. The merger became final on December 31, 1997, after Orbital received all necessary regulatory clearances and approval of the transaction by Ashtech shareholders. Under the terms of the merger that were previously announced, Orbital now owns approximately 66% of the combined company, which will continue to operate as Magellan, after providing Ashtech security holders with $25 million in cash. The former Ashtech security holders own the remaining 34% of the new company. As a result of the merger, Magellan now offers the broadest line of products that utilize Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite technology to provide navigation and positioning information for consumer, automotive and professional markets. Magellan is also a leading maker of satellite-based messaging and voice communications products, including hand-held mobile e-mail messaging units and portable satellite telephones. Mr. David W. Thompson, Orbital's President and Chief Executive Officer, said, ``In 1997, through the Ashtech merger and the acquisition of the PathMaster car navigation system, we positioned Magellan to be the world's leading company in the development, manufacture and sales of a variety of products that use satellite technology for rapidly expanding global markets in navigation, positioning and communications applications.'' Magellan is now headed by Mr. Charles M. Boesenberg, Ashtech's former President and Chief Executive Officer, who assumes the same positions at Magellan. Mr. Boesenberg also will become an Executive Vice President of Orbital. The combined company employs over 500 people at its Sunnyvale, CA headquarters and at major product centers in San Dimas, CA; Rochester Hills, MI; and Moscow, Russia. Its products will be available at over 12,000 retail locations in the United States and through more than 150 distributors in 90 countries. It will maintain manufacturing operations in California and Taiwan. In the consumer market, Magellan is an industry leader and product innovator in hand-held GPS navigators and other low-cost satellite access products that are making satellite networks increasingly available to users around the world. Magellan's products are used in outdoor recreation activities, such as hiking, camping, hunting and fishing, and in boating, general aviation and related consumer applications. Magellan is also the United States market leader in high-performance automotive navigation systems, developed by the company's Driver Information Systems unit, which provide turn-by-turn directions and electronic map route guidance to individual motorists. With the addition of Ashtech's product lines, Magellan is also now an industry pacesetter in the development and manufacture of high-performance GPS and related satellite navigation products, components and technologies. These products cover professional, OEM and other high-precision industrial applications, such as guiding aircraft to low-visibility landings, surveying for construction projects, guiding equipment in farming and mining operations, broadcasting ``differential GPS'' correction signals for the U.S. Coast Guard and monitoring of Earth's surface movements for geodetic researchers. As a satellite navigation technology leader, Ashtech has developed proprietary techniques that substantially increase positioning accuracy, reduce errors from signal distortion and decrease the time required to calculate an initial position. In addition, Ashtech pioneered GPS+GLONASS (Russian satellite navigation system) technology and possesses significant capabilities in application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) and software development. Orbital is a space and information systems company that designs, manufactures, operates and markets a broad range of affordable space infrastructure systems, satellite access products and satellite-provided services including launch vehicles, satellites, sensors and electronics, satellite ground systems and software, satellite-based navigation and communications products, and satellite-delivered fixed and mobile communications and Earth imaging services.
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