HUGHES SPACE AND COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY Communications and Customer Relations P.O. Box 92919 (S10/S323) Los Angeles, CA 90009 (310) 364-6363 www.hughespace.com

The GOES satellites provide meteorological measurements and data to NOAA, NASA, and to representatives of the meteorological and academic communities, and to countries around the world.

Under terms of the contract, Hughes will provide two spacecraft to be delivered in geostationary orbit. Designated GOES N and GOES O, the satellites will ensure continuity of the GOES East and GOES West spacecraft and will be available for launch onboard Boeing Delta III vehicles in 2001 and 2003. The contract also includes fixed-price options for two additional spacecraft, GOES P and GOES Q, priced at $190.9 million and $185 million respectively.

"This contract re-establishes Hughes as the primary supplier of geostationary weather satellites for NASA and NOAA," said Steven D. Dorfman, vice chairman of Hughes Electronics Corporation, parent to Hughes Space and Communications Company. "During the past two decades, Hughes has provided five GOES spacecraft to the United States as well as five Geostationary Meteorological Satellites for Japan. We are pleased to resume the building of this very important national asset."

The new satellites are based on the highly successful HS 601 spacecraft model. More than 65 HS 601s have been ordered to date. The new GOES satellites will provide more accurate location of severe storms and other weather phenomena, resulting in more precise warnings to the general public and industry.

In addition, Hughes will furnish the satellite's communications subsystem with a search and rescue capability to detect distress signals from ships and airplanes, and will also furnish space environmental monitoring instruments and operator training. Ground station upgrades required for the new GOES satellites will be provided by Hughes' teammate Integral Systems Inc. Hughes will also integrate three government-furnished instruments: an imager and sounder built by ITT Industries, Inc., and a solar X-ray imager built by Lockheed Martin.

"We are proud to have been selected to provide the newest GOES satellites," said Donald L. Cromer, president of Hughes Space and Communications Company. "We have assembled a team of the most highly qualified companies in the world to provide improved capabilities to help NOAA predict severe storms, such as hurricanes and tornadoes. These two GOES satellites will set the stage for next-generation weather prediction, a capability which has far-reaching benefits for all mankind in emergency weather situations."

The three-axis HS 601 body-stabilized spacecraft design enables the primary sensors to "stare" at Earth and thus frequently image clouds, monitor Earth's surface temperature, and sound Earth's atmosphere for its vertical temperature and water vapor distribution. Atmospheric phenomena can be tracked, ensuring real-time coverage of short-lived dynamic events, such as severe local storms and tropical cyclones, two meteorological events that directly affect public safety, property, and ultimately economic health and development.

GOES N will also permit NOAA's hurricane forecasters to more accurately determine the path of these damaging tropical storms which, in turn, will allow preparation of protective measures for both people and property, while eliminating the need for such precautions in areas where the storms will not have a devastating effect.

The imager is a multispectral five-channel instrument that produces visual and infrared images of Earth's surface, oceans, cloud cover and severe storm developments. The multi-spectral sounder provides vertical temperature and moisture profiles of the atmosphere augmenting data from the imager. Sounder data is also used in computer models which produce short- and long-range weather forecasts.

A new solar X-ray imager will monitor the sun's X-rays for the early detection of solar flares. This early warning is important because these solar flares affect not only the safety of humans in high-altitude missions, such as the Space Shuttle, but also military and commercial communications.

The GOES satellites also carry space environment instruments, built by Panametrics Inc., which monitor particle emissions including solar protons, alpha particles, and electrons. These instruments also include a magnetometer, built by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), which samples the Earth's magnetosphere.

A data collection system on GOES receives and relays environmental data sensed by widely dispersed surface platforms such as river and rain gauges, seismometers, tide gauges, buoys, ships and automatic weather stations. Platforms transmit sensor data to the satellite at regular or self-timed intervals, upon interrogation by the satellite, or in an emergency alarm mode whenever a sensor receives information exceeding a preset level.

With GOES N and O, Hughes will have built a total of seven spacecraft in the GOES series. The first Hughes-built GOES satellite, GOES D, was launched in 1980. This was followed by GOES E in 1981, GOES F in 1983, GOES G in 1986 (booster failed during launch), and GOES H in 1987. The GOES satellites transmit data collected to NOAA's Wallops, Va. ground station, which relays the data to the NOAA Satellite Operations Control Center in Suitland, Md. The information is then processed and distributed to users throughout the world.

Hughes Space and Communications Company is the world's largest manufacturer of geostationary commercial communications satellites, and is also a major supplier of spacecraft for communications and space exploration to the U.S. government, and builder of weather satellites for the United States and Japan. The earnings of Hughes Electronics are used to calculate the earnings per share attributable to GMH (NYSE symbol) common stock.