Altera Reinforces Product-Term Leadership with Production Availability of 2.5-V MAX 7000B Family.

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 30, 2000

Altera Corporation (Nasdaq:ALTR) today announced the availability of the company's entire 2.5-V MAX(R) 7000B family of high-performance programmable logic devices (PLDs). In addition to being the first 2.5-V product-term-based PLD family in the industry, the MAX 7000B devices offer features such as GTL+ and SSTL I/O capabilities, as well as unmatched pin-to-pin performance. Altera's 4.5-ns EPM7256B and 5.5-ns EPM7512B devices are more than 50 percent faster than competitive product-term offerings. The EPM7128B, now at 4.0-ns, is 25 percent faster than any other shipping product at a comparable density. Other family members offer 3.5-ns pin-to-pin performance, with maximum on-chip speeds of up to 285-MHz. The MAX 7000B family is ideal for communications applications such as PCI arbitration, cache controllers, high-speed memory and microprocessor interfaces, and peripheral devices that require high performance, low-power, advanced I/O standards, and fast in-system programmability.

"We continue to see strong growth and increasing customer demand for the MAX architecture in markets such as wireless, wired, and optical communication systems," said Erik Cleage, Altera senior vice president of marketing. "We are committed to meeting this need with our MAX 7000B family of devices, which offers even greater performance and lower price and power consumption than our industry-leading 3.3-V MAX 7000A devices."

"The Altera MAX EPM7128B-4 provided the right combination of high performance and easy-to-use software for our company's optical network design needs," said Joseph Mao, hardware engineer for Redback Networks. "At 2.5-volts, the lower power consumption of this device was also an added benefit."

Device Features

The MAX EPM7128B, EPM7256B, EPM7512B, EPM7064B, and EPM7032B devices feature high performance, low power and low-voltage I/O standards such as Gunning transceiver logic plus (GTL+) and stub series terminated logic for 2.5- (SSTL-2) and 3.3-V (SSTL-3). The devices operate at a core voltage of 2.5-V and feature Altera's patented MultiVolt(TM) interface that allows designers to seamlessly interface between 3.3-, 2.5- and 1.8-V devices in a mixed-voltage environment. All MAX 7000B devices also support hot-insertion which is critical for many communications applications. In-system programmability is supported through the IEEE standard 1149.1 JTAG interface using the JEDEC standard (JESD-71) Jam(TM) Standard Test and Programming Language (STAPL).

Design Support

The MAX 7000B family of devices, like all MAX devices, is supported by Altera's MAX+PLUS(R) II development system for PC and workstation platforms. Altera's MAX+PLUS II software provides seamless integration with tools from Cadence, Mentor Graphics, Synopsys, Viewlogic and other leading EDA vendors. Altera' s full-featured E+MAX(TM) software package supports all MAX 7000 and MAX 3000 devices and is available for free download from the Altera web site at http://www.altera.com.

Availability, Packaging & Pricing

The Altera EPM7128B, EPM7256B, and EPM7512B PLDs are shipping now in volume. The EPM7064B has begun initial sampling, and the final device in the MAX 7000B family, the EPM7032B, will begin sampling in June. Pricing for the MAX 7000B family members is as low as $1.75 in high-volume production quantities. Packaging options include 100- and 144-pin TQFP, 100- and 256-pin FineLine BGA(TM), and the 0.8-millimeter ball pitch 49- and 169-pin Ultra FineLine BGA packages. The 169-pin Ultra FineLine BGA requires only 50 percent of the board space of a 100-pin TQFP.

About Altera

Altera Corporation, The Programmable Solutions Company(R), was founded in 1983 and is a leading supplier of programmable logic devices and associated logic development software tools. Programmable logic devices are semiconductor chips that can be programmed on-site, using software tools that run on personal computers or engineering workstations. User benefits include ease of use, lower risk, and fast time-to-market. Altera's CMOS-based programmable logic devices address high-speed, high-density and low-power applications in the telecommunications, data communications, computer peripheral, and industrial markets. Altera common stock is traded on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the symbol ALTR. More information on Altera can be obtained on the Internet at http://www.altera.com.

Note to Editors: Altera, The Programmable Solutions Company, MAX, MultiVolt, Jam, MAX+PLUS, E+MAX, Fineline BGA, and specific device designations are trademarks and/or service marks of Altera Corporation in the U.S. and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective holders.