AeroAstro Recognized with Virginia Vanguard Award

Ashburn, VA – April 29, 2004

AeroAstro, Inc., a leading provider of miniature satellites and related technology products, has been awarded the Virginia Vanguard Award from the Virginia Chamber of Commerce, recognizing its position as the fastest-growing technology company in the Commonwealth. This marks the second consecutive year AeroAstro has been named to Virginia's Fantastic 50 list and its first year as a Virginia Vanguard Award winner. These achievements recognize the significant growth AeroAstro has experienced in recent years through the award of several significant contracts, including STPSat-1, AeroAstro's largest spacecraft development contract.

Each year, the Virginia Chamber of Commerce highlights Virginia's fifty fastest-growing companies on a statewide basis, bestowing Virginia's most prestigious award for small, entrepreneurial companies – Virginia's Fantastic 50 Awards. Of these top fifty companies, those with the highest growth rates in each of four sectors – technology, retail/wholesale, manufacturing, and services – as well as those with the highest revenues and highest growth rates overall, are honored as Virginia Vanguard Award winners.

Virginia's Fantastic 50 award program is sponsored by the Virginia Chamber, Virginia Business Magazine, Goodman and Company, SunTrust Bank and Westfields Marriott, and is open to all privately held companies headquartered in Virginia. The honor roll of winners demonstrates the great diversity and vitality of business enterprises in Virginia. Companies are ranked by four-year total growth rates (from 1999 through 2002 for the current awards). They must also demonstrate positive net income and positive revenue growth in their most recent fiscal year compared to their previous year. With an overall four-year growth rate of greater than 1500%, AeroAstro rose to the top of the list in the technology sector this year.

AeroAstro, Inc. is a leader in the emerging field of miniature spacecraft, innovating applications in science, remote sensing, and communications. The company’s focus is opening the space frontier to a larger and more diverse community of users. AeroAstro manufactures complete spacecraft and components that are used in its own systems and for spacecraft developed by other institutions in the US and abroad. NASA, the US Air Force, commercial and academic customers have all relied on AeroAstro spacecraft and components over our 15-year history.