[1] Screenrant has a report from a Star Trek panel this past weeknd at Creation Entertainment’s 16th Annual Grand Slam: The Sci-Fi Summitin Burbank, CA. Here are some highlights:

• The movie will be rated PG-13 and have a budget “far below” $200 million. A $160 million price-tag has been floating around the web for months now.
• The most interesting tidbit revealed a story (I had yet to hear) about of how JJ Abrams came onto the project. Apparently Steven Spielberg read the script and helped convince J.J. Abrams to sign on to the project. [2] TrekMovie reports that Spielberg also visited the set during shooting scenes on the Enterprise and helped JJ Abrams work out a scene to help ‘with the action’
• Leonard Nimoy also admitted that “it would have been damaging to the story to put Shatner in the film.” As much as I want to see William Shatner in the film, an attemp to erase Captain Kirk’s death from Star Trek: Generations would waste valuable screen time, and just serve to sidetrack the story.
• The USS Enterprise will be assembled in space, although parts of it will be assembled on Earth.
• Screenwriter Roberto Orci claims that the film was pushed back because “Paramount really wants it to be a summer blockbuster.”
• There is at least one Star Trek reference in Transformers 2

You can read the full report on Screenrant.