Accelerated Technology's Nucleus EDGE Embedded Development Environment Now Supports PowerPC Architecture.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Accelerated Technology(R), a Mentor Graphics division (Nasdaq:MENT), today announced that its Eclipse-powered Nucleus(R) EDGE software development environment is now available for the PowerPC architecture. This gives developers designing with PowerPC processors an advanced, comprehensive embedded tool suite for building, compiling, debugging, and deploying embedded applications, quickly and easily.

Already supporting the ARM platform, the Nucleus EDGE environment portfolio has been expanded to give PowerPC processor developers an all inclusive software tool to build a wide range of applications including wireless infrastructure, next-generation Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexor (DSLAMs), network storage, enterprise routing and switching, printing and imaging, telecom switching and customer premises equipment.

"At Eclipse, we are embracing the growing use of our framework for embedded development," said Mike Milinkovich, executive director of the Eclipse Foundation. "We see that the propagation of existing Eclipse-based tools like the Nucleus EDGE environment to important processor architectures such as the PowerPC processor as a key to its widespread adoption."

"This new environment brings our compiler, debugger, UML and real-time operating system (RTOS) technology for the PowerPC architecture together under the Eclipse standard platform," said Robert Day, director of marketing, Accelerated Technology Division, Mentor Graphics. "The Nucleus EDGE environment gives PowerPC processor developers tighter tool integration, total control over the quality and stability of their applications, full control of release cycles, shorter learning curves and a common platform with desktop tools."

For use with the Eclipse open platform, the Nucleus EDGE software includes an intuitive graphical user interface (GUI) that provides tutorials and demos to guide users through the development process. The user interface (UI) is also more responsive, permitting users to interact with the GUI while the Nucleus EDGE software is busy running a background task. This is particularly useful when debugging large applications with multiple cores, as engineers typically focus on different parts of their application, concurrently.

The Nucleus EDGE software contains an advanced project manager, complete with an editor and builder, that helps users automate their build process. Developers can now set up one or more build environments by specifying the compiler and build options, giving total control over multiple projects and allowing for quick and easy revisions of their embedded systems.

Adhering to the Eclipse platform debug paradigm, and hence offering ultimate openness, the Nucleus debugger provides developers with a number of debugging environments. For example, using host-based debugging, software developers can experiment by running an application on the host machine before the final hardware is available or even decided upon. This allows the software developer to start coding earlier in the development cycle. Instruction set simulation and on-chip debugging via JTAG then allows users to run their "real" optimized embedded code from the same environment.

The Nucleus debugger also provides all the basic execution and memory control, plus advanced debugging features such as run-mode debug and kernel awareness when using a real-time operating system (RTOS). It also provides real-time trace, profiling, performance analysis, and code coverage for doing sophisticated code analysis. Additionally, the Nucleus debugger offers embedded developers true multi-core debugging, allowing them to fully debug their complete embedded system, whether small or complex.

The Nucleus EDGE environment supports PowerPC architectures provided by Freescale, Xilinx, IBM and AMCC. Dynamic variant support (DVS) built into the compiler allows developers to easily add new variants of the PowerPC family. Additionally, using XML technology, developers can download updates via email

Pricing and Availability

Licenses for the complete Nucleus EDGE development suite begin at U.S. $3,000 per seat. For more information, please contact Accelerated Technology at 800-468-6853 or [e-mail].

About Mentor Graphics

Mentor Graphics Corporation (Nasdaq: MENT) is a world leader in electronic hardware and software design solutions, providing products, consulting services and award-winning support for the world's most successful electronics and semiconductor companies. Established in 1981, the company reported revenues over the last 12 months of over $700 million and employs approximately 3,850 people worldwide. Corporate headquarters are located at 8005 S.W. Boeckman Road, Wilsonville, Oregon 97070-7777; Silicon Valley headquarters are located at 1001 Ridder Park Drive, San Jose, California 95131-2314. World Wide Web site: http://www.mentor.com/.

Accelerated Technology, a Mentor Graphics division, is located in Mobile, Alabama with sales offices and distributors worldwide. By providing embedded systems developers with a focus on service, well-documented source code and industry-leading non-royalty-based Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS) software including modeling software, prototyping tools, kernels, middleware and development tools, AT's suite of products shorten time-to-market and provide a complete solution for engineers. For more information, please visit www.acceleratedtechnology.com or e-mail us at [e-mail].

Mentor Graphics, Accelerated Technology and Nucleus are registered trademarks of Mentor Graphics Corporation. All other company or product names are the registered trademarks or trademarks of their respective owners.