Lockheed Martin Corp. and Fiber Rx, Inc., have signed an agreement to license to FiberRx certain fiber optic technology for use in hospitals and medical facilities.

In exchange for the license, Lockheed Martin will receive royalties and a 40 percent equity interest in FiberRx. The issuance of the license and completion of the other transactions are subject to a number of closing conditions, including FiberRx financing.

The Lockheed Martin-patented technology was originally developed for sophisticated military applications requiring very high bandwidth, protocol independence and the ability to adapt to existing equipment. The Fiber Rx, Inc. network will use a single fiber-optic cable to communicate with existing networks and systems located throughout hospitals and medical facilities, with implementations to provide extremely high bandwidth communication of medical patient data.

The technology enables data to be combined from multiple separate sources of medical information onto a single network. This includes single-cable management of information from copper-wire networks, traditional bundled fiber optic cables, wireless networks and the Internet.

This all-passive, fiber optic network has the potential to render existing medical network architectures -- consisting of hubs, switches and routers -- obsolete. Traditional copper and fiber optic networks are limited in their ability to simultaneously handle increasingly high bandwidth data demands without significant hardware upgrades.

Such demands are expected to increase with the need to distribute unedited, complex medical images and information to medical professionals. This trend demands the cost-effective use of graphics interactively with live voice, video, wireless and Internet-based information to support collaborative meetings, which can be achieved by current systems with only marginal results.

"The Fiber Rx, Inc. network will effectively become the foundation of communications throughout hospitals and medical facilities," said Robert Kearney, CEO and President of Fiber RX, Inc. "This is the paradigm shift in network technology that can fulfill the promise of a real-time, centralized medical communications network. This medical network can greatly enhance existing networks and provide an expandable structure with inherent growth capacity for future network and communications requirements and technologies."

Lockheed Martin's patented technology, called Fiber Optic Bus Wavelength Division Multiplexing (FOBWDM(TM)), provides a non-blocking, bi-directional, protocol-independent, multi-channel, optical transport system. The multi- channel FOBWDM(TM) uses a self-monitoring, protocol-independent topology to accommodate simultaneous transfers of discrete, analog, digital and wireless transmissions on a single fiber optic cable. It has been successfully used on multiple military aircraft in flight operations and has demonstrated significant architectural advantages over currently available systems.

"Multiple FOBWDM(TM) fiber optic cables can also be used to provide redundant communications for ultra-high reliability needs on a very cost- effective basis," Kearney said. "This network can yield immediate improvements in patient care and provide significant cost savings to the hospitals and medical facilities."

Fiber Rx, Inc. is an Orlando-based company incorporated in May 2000 to commercialize the Lockheed Martin network technology exclusively in hospitals and medical facilities. Fiber Rx, Inc. will relocate its corporate office next to the University of Central Florida and plans to hire more than 25 employees during the next year.

Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin is a global enterprise principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture and integration of advanced-technology systems, products and services. The corporation's core businesses are systems integration, space, aeronautics and technology services.

NOTE: Statements in this press release, including the statements relating to future performance, are considered forward-looking statements under the federal securities laws, including the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Sometimes these statements will contain words such as "believes," "expects," "intends," "plans," or "estimates," and other similar words. These statements are not guarantees of our future performance and are subject to risks, uncertainties and other important factors that could cause our actual performance or achievements to be materially different from those we may project. We expressly disclaim a duty to provide updates to these forward-looking statements after the date of this press release to reflect events or circumstances or changes in expectations or the occurrence of anticipated events.

In addition to the factors set forth in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (http://www.sec.gov/), the following factors could affect the forward-looking statements: availability of financing for Fiber Rx; the ability of Fiber Rx to recruit qualified technical and management staff, ability of Fiber Rx to develop a market for its products, adaptability of technology developed in a military context to commercial applications, economic climate, timing of completion of products for market, development and marketing of competing products and technologies, uncertainties inherent in start-up companies; and the unfavorable economic climate for start-up companies. These are only some of the numerous factors which may affect the forward-looking statements in this press release.

SOURCE: Lockheed Martin Corp. and Fiber Rx, Inc.