SPACEHAB, Incorporated (NASDAQ:SPAB – News), a leading provider of commercial space services, today announced plans to develop a new company division that will focus on manufacturing pharmaceuticals and materials in space for distribution into the commercial marketplace.
With a 22-year heritage of processing and transporting over a thousand experiments to low Earth orbit, SPACEHAB plans to leverage the company’s deep understanding of microgravity science and payload processing into a new focus towards on-orbit manufacturing for both intercompany initiatives and as a service provider for other customers.
“The International Space Station (ISS) Program is now transitioning from the construction and experimentation phases to its intended utilization phase,” said Thomas B. Pickens, III, SPACEHAB President and CEO. “With SPACEHAB’s extensive experience and knowledge in processing highly sophisticated space bound payloads, it is a natural ‘next step’ for the Company to now utilize the ISS for the advancement of many identified experiments into viable and useful manufactured products. The microgravity environment provides a unique, yet generally unexploited, manufacturing platform for the production of various life-altering pharmaceuticals and materials. SPACEHAB’s entrepreneurial energy and unique capabilities bring to the equation exactly what is needed to make the leap from science to the manufacturing of valuable products that have the potential to save and improve lives,” concluded Pickens.
To execute this new direction, SPACEHAB is applying resources and tapping into the Company’s strategic partnerships with key national and international space agencies and companies as well as the institutional science community. SPACEHAB plans to release more information on the selected life science products to be manufactured in space at the Space Investment Summit in New York, New York on April 16, 2007. The summit, hosted by the Space Commerce Roundtable and the Space Frontier Foundation, provides a forum for leading investors, industry representatives, entrepreneurs, and experts to present and appraise the newest and most promising space commerce investment opportunities.
About SPACEHAB, Incorporated
Incorporated in 1984, SPACEHAB (www.spacehab.com) is a leading provider of commercial space products and services to NASA, international space agencies, Department of Defense, and private customers worldwide. The Company offers end-to-end space access solutions, space systems development, mission integration and pre-launch processing facilities and services, and large-scale government program support services.
The statements in this document may contain forward-looking statements that are made pursuant to the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks, trends, and uncertainties that could cause actual results to be materially different from the forward-looking statement. These factors include, but are not limited to, continued government support and funding for key space programs, product performance and market acceptance of products and services, as well as other risk factors and business considerations described in the company’s Securities & Exchange Commission filings including the annual report on Form 10-K. Any forward-looking statements in this document should be evaluated in light of these important risk factors. The Company assumes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements.
