[OGC Press Release] Northrop Grumman Assumes Strategic Member Role in the OGC

[OGC Press Release]

PRESS ANNOUNCEMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For information about this announcement, contact:

Sam Bacharach
Executive Director, Outreach and Community Adoption
Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc
tel: +1-703-352-3938
sbacharach at opengeospatial.org

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Wayland, MA, October 15, 2007 - The Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.
(OGC) today announced that Northrop Grumman Corporation has upgraded
its OGC membership from Principal Member to Strategic Member.
Strategic Membership is the highest level of membership in OGC.

Northrop Grumman's membership is through Northrop Grumman's
Information Technology sector. Northrop Grumman joined OGC in 1996 and
has been either a Strategic or Principal Member of the Consortium
since 2001. As a premier integrator for the geoprocessing and imagery
communities and now as a Strategic Member in OGC, Northrop Grumman
plays a leading role in the development and implementation of OGC
standards for geospatial interoperability.

Northrop Grumman's continuing commitment to OGC reflects the
company's understanding of their diverse clients' needs for
interoperable geoprocessing. Northrop Grumman is able to help
companies and agencies address increasingly complex problems that
involve sharing spatial data and processing resources. Decision
support for critical infrastructure protection and emergency
management, for example, may require some users to remotely access
multiple sophisticated image processing servers while others rely on
real-time updates to simple maps on their Web-connected PDAs, or
alerts from sensor arrays. These flows of data and instructions
typically cross the boundaries of multiple proprietary software
platforms, so interoperability interfaces are essential.

"Northrop Grumman's continued membership and active
involvement in OGC is part of the company's commitment to taking a
leadership role in the effective and interoperable use of geospatial
information and technology in meeting the mission and business needs
of government at all levels as well as the commercial and other
non-government sectors," said John Olesak, vice president,
Geospatial Intelligence, for Northrop Grumman.

Under the terms of Northrop Grumman's Strategic Membership, the
company will provide the Consortium with significant resources to
advance OGC's Compliance Testing, Outreach and Interoperability
Programs.

David Schell, Chairman and CEO of OGC, said, "We are very
fortunate to have Northrop Grumman as a Strategic Member. Northrop
Grumman brings both corporate commitment and leadership to help the
widespread implementation and use of standards-based geospatial
capabilities in spatial data infrastructures both domestically and
around the world."

Northrop Grumman is one of the world's premier providers of
information management and systems engineering solutions for
government and industry.

The OGC® is an international industry consortium of more than 350
companies, government agencies, research organizations, and
universities participating in a consensus process to develop publicly
available interface specifications. OpenGIS® Specifications
support interoperable solutions that "geo-enable" the Web,
wireless and location-based services, and mainstream IT. The
specifications empower technology developers to make complex spatial
information and services accessible and useful with all kinds of
applications. Visit the OGC website at http://www.opengeospatial.org.