ARM Strengthens Technology Access Program with Global Network of Design Centers.

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

CAMBRIDGE, UK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 20, 2000

ARM (LSE:ARM); (Nasdaq:ARMHY), the industry's leading provider of 16/32-bit embedded RISC microprocessor solutions, today announced it has appointed four new ARM Approved Design Partners to the company's ATAP(TM) technology access program: Barco Silex, Siemens, SOTA Design Technology Inc. and Winfinity. These new partners, working together with the existing ARM ATAP partners, will create a global network of ARM Approved Design Centers, providing ARM silicon and systems partners worldwide with the design resources necessary to meet the growing demand for system-on-chip (SoC) products based on the ARM(R) cores.

"Design houses, such as those included in ARM's ATAP program, play an increasingly important role in the integration of intellectual property (IP) into system-on-chip designs," said Jim Tully, chief analyst at Dataquest. "Closer relationships between IP providers, ASIC vendors, system OEMs and design houses is inevitable in the embedded industry, as this type of SoC collaboration enables accelerated design processes while reducing time-to-market."

First introduced in December 1998, ARMs ATAP program provides developers worldwide with access to design centers that are trained, qualified and equipped with ARM hardware and software tools for integrating ARM CPU cores and AMBA(TM) bus peripherals into ASIC and SoC designs. ATAP partners now include Barco Silex (Belgium), Cadence (Scotland), Sican GmbH (Germany and California), Siemens (Germany), SOTA Design Technology Inc. (Taiwan), Winfinity (Germany) and Wipro Limited (India).

"ARM developed the ATAP program to provide our partners with the greatest possible flexibility and freedom of choice for design expertise for any digital electronic product application, from networking to automotive to wireless communications," said David Lewis, ATAP program manager, ARM. "With these new ATAP members now qualified as ARM Approved Design Centers, we have more than 600 engineers who are able to support ARM Powered(TM) SoC development activity, in any region and any time zone around the world."

About the ATAP Program

ATAP design partners must go through a strict qualification process to become an ARM Approved Design Center. This includes a design flow audit, training on implementing designs with ARM cores, tools, AMBA bus peripherals and development techniques. Each design center must demonstrate its own unique skills in specific technology domains, as well as market segment expertise. The ATAP program also provides additional benefits such as geographic and time-zone locality and local language support.

For more information on the ARM ATAP program, please email [e-mail] or visit the website at www.arm.com.

About Barco Silex

Based in Brussels, Barco Silex is a leader in the development of standard cell ASICs, with competencies in several fields including SoC and IP integration for applications including video and image processing. As part of the Belgium Electronic BARCO group, Barco Silex invests continuously in design methodologies and in the most recent development tools and equipment.

"As a member of ARM's ATAP program, Barco Silex is able to increase our abilities to provide high-quality ARM core-based designs and offer our customers the technical expertise they require for their rapidly increasing time-to-market requirements," said Geert Decorte, business development, Barco Silex.

About Siemens

Siemens ATD Electronic Design Centre, which is based in Munich, provides the complete range of services required by the semiconductor and systems integration industry and offers both turn-key solutions as well as individual solutions for a particular stage of the overall design process. The Electronic Design Centre can boast recent design achievements in areas such as automotive, telecommunications, computer peripherals and powerline communications.

"Siemens ATD has previously decided on the ARM AMBA bus as the preferred interconnection for it's own silicon IP products," said Dr. Artur Weller, manager of the ATD Electronic Design Centre. "This partnership with ARM in the ATAP program will strengthen the ability of Siemens ATD to deliver embedded solutions around this key microcontroller architecture."

About SOTA Design Technology Inc.

Based in Taiwan, SOTA Design Technology Inc. is a pioneer and technology leader in silicon integration, physical design methodology and silicon IP authoring for the DSM SoC market.

"SOTA has been focusing our efforts on the Internet appliances (IA) market for years, and ARM clearly is the leader in providing CPU engines in this field," said Mr. Yih-Sheng Wey, president, SOTA. "This alliance with ARM will definitely help us in providing our customers with highest integrated, most cost-effective solutions in the future."

About Winfinity

Based in Germany, Winfinity offers excellent experience in SoC developments for IT, computing and portable products as well as communication ASICs and ASSPs. The design house offers state-of-the-art design services to meet sophisticated market requirements which can be reached only with innovative SoC integration.

"Winfinity has gathered many years of design experience in ARM core-based SoC integration," said Walter Ortmeuller, head of SoC Design Centre, Winfinity. "We have been involved with ARM in SoC methodology since 1991/1992, and look forward to expanding our relationship as an ATAP partner. This alliance with ARM will definitely help us to provide our customers with cost-effective SoC solutions with the shortest possible time-to-market."

About ARM

ARM, a leading intellectual property (IP) provider, licenses high-performance, low-cost, power-efficient RISC processors, peripherals, and system-chip designs to leading international electronics companies. ARM also provides comprehensive support required in developing a complete system. ARMs microprocessor cores are rapidly becoming the volume RISC standard in such markets as portable communications, hand-held computing, multimedia digital consumer and embedded solutions. More information on ARM is available at http://www.arm.com.

ARM is a registered trademark of ARM Limited. ARM Powered, ATAP and AMBA are trademarks of ARM Limited. All other brands or product names are the property of their respective holders. ARM is used to represent ARM Holdings plc (LSE: ARM and NASDAQ: ARMHY); its operating company, ARM Limited; and the regional subsidiaries: ARM, INC., ARM KK; ARM Korea Ltd.