The Associated Press reported in August that NASA had all but grounded its space shuttle fleet because inspections had revealed a "startling number of damaged wires" in the Colombia space craft as well as in Endeavor and Discovery. As each shuttle carries over 200 miles of wire, it's not surprising that insulators are sometimes damaged during maintenance or worn away during flight. But the extent of the damage surprised even NASA, which found dozens of wires on each space craft which required repair.

What does this have to do with Glenair? It illustrates the importance of understanding our customers in terms of the broader range of problems they are faced with, rather than just the current list of products they buy.

As many of you know, NASA has bought hundreds of Sav-Con® connectors from Glenair over the lifespan of the space shuttle program. In fact, our Sav-Cons® are used to protect umbilical connectors during lift-off on every space shuttle mission. Which raises an important question. Is NASA:

(A) a "Sav-Con®" customer, or

(B) an "interconnect cable protection" customer?

Taking a problem-solving approach to meeting the needs of our market makes sense on many levels. And by the way, the list of potential problems we can help our customers solve is not just limited to the physical protection of wires. We have valuable expertise in:

• Reducing the size and weight of interconnect systems,
• Solving high vibration and shock de-coupling problems,
• Improving safety with low smoke and low toxicity materials,
• Eliminating signal distortion caused by electromagnetic interference,
• Ensuring interconnect system performance in high and low temperature applications, and
• Reducing the cost of interconnect system ownership through the use of advanced corrosion resistant materials and technologies.