- John Schumacher, former NASA Chief of Staff, appointed president of the new company that will gather Astrium's capabilities in the North American market

- Astrium Americas will also provide government customers with satellite communications services formerly marketed by Vizada, Inc.

Astrium, a world leader in space technologies, and EADS North America today jointly announced the creation of Astrium Americas, America's newest space company. A subsidiary of EADS North America, Astrium Americas will bring Astrium's broad global space capabilities to North America. Astrium Americas will also provide government customers with secure satellite communications services formerly marketed by Vizada, Inc.

'The creation of Astrium Americas as a U.S. company is an important step in better serving our North American customers,' said John Schumacher, President of Astrium Americas. 'The space marketplace is increasingly global, and we want to provide U.S. government and private sector customers with the benefits of our commercial approach to providing space capabilities from complete space systems to state of the art satellite services.'

Astrium Americas, headquartered in Herndon, VA will provide Astrium's advanced telecommunications, geo-information, space transportation and satellite capabilities specifically tailored to meet the demanding requirements of U.S. and Canadian government customers.

Government telecommunications services will initially be the most prominent activity of Astrium Americas, combining the team and assets from former Vizada Inc., and Astrium Services (formerly Paradigm) solutions. Based in Rockville, Md., the team will work closely with U.S. government and Department of Defense agencies to service the satellite-based communications needs of a wide range of government users and operations worldwide for their most critical missions. In addition to offering mobile satellite solutions (L-Band services from providers such as Inmarsat, Iridium and Thuraya), it will provide services from Astrium Services' military satellites (X-Band and UHF) plus services from industry leading fixed satellite service providers (in C, Ku and commercial and military Ka-Band).

In the coming weeks, Astrium Americas will provide additional information on its space transportation, geo-information, satellite and hosted payload capabilities.

About Astrium

Astrium is the number one company in Europe for space technologies and the third in the world. In 2011, Astrium had a turnover close to €5 billion and 18,000 employees worldwide, mainly in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Spain and the Netherlands.

Astrium is the sole European company that covers the whole range of civil and defence space systems and services.

Its three business units are: Astrium Space Transportation for launchers and orbital infrastructure; Astrium Satellites for spacecraft and ground segment; Astrium Services for comprehensive fixed and mobile end-to-end solutions covering secure and commercial satcoms and networks, high security and broadcast satellite communications equipment and systems, and bespoke geo-information services, worldwide.

Astrium is a wholly owned subsidiary of EADS, a global leader in aerospace, defence and related services. In 2011, the Group – comprising Airbus, Astrium, Cassidian and Eurocopter – generated revenues of € 49.1 billion and employed a workforce of over 133,000.

www.astrium.eads.net

About EADS North America

EADS North America is the U.S.-based operation of EADS, a global leader in aerospace, defense, and related services. EADS contributes more than $13 billion to the U.S. economy annually and supports over 225,000 American jobs through its network of suppliers. EADS North America, headquartered in Herndon, Va., offers a broad array of advanced solutions to meet U.S. military and commercial requirements, including fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, homeland security systems, public safety communications, defense electronics and avionics, and threat detection systems.