Certess Expands in Europe - Adds ISS Group as Distributor in Scandinavia and Northern Europe.

CAMPBELL, Calif. -- Certess, Inc., the leader of functional qualification solutions for system-on-chip (SoC) designs and intellectual property (IP) blocks, today announced that ISS Group, based in Sweden, will distribute and support Certess' Certitude software product throughout northern Europe. ISS -- The Scandinavian Gateway -- targets Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. Certitude is the first commercial functional qualification software product. Certitude certifies that if a semiconductor chip design has a bug, it will be found. It tackles the most formidable problem in functional verification: the absence of objective quality assurance in SoCs and IP blocks.

"To expand its strong European presence, Certess selected a successful distributor who knows how to break open new markets for advanced technologies," says Michel Courtoy, president and CEO of Certess, Inc. "ISS Group has a long, proven track record in establishing innovative technologies and tools; they understand what is important to key customers and are able to drive the adoption of new technology. This is key to us marketing our functional qualification product, Certitude."

Ronny Stromberg, CEO of ISS Group, agrees, "Certitude is the strongest newcomer within the EDA block that I have seen in many years and the problem it solves is that of everyone using verification tools - how to qualify the verification process. It provides an answer to the question that everyone today has, from management to project leaders to the verification team itself: when is enough, enough?"

Certess' Certitude Function Qualification Software

Certitude's functional qualification is used by design teams with two distinct goals. The first one is the improvement of the quality of the functional verification for IP blocks and SoC designs. In this use model, Certitude assists the user to trace back from the undetected mutations to identify the missing or erroneous elements in the functional verification environment. The second goal is to objectively measure the quality of the verification. In this use model, Certitude provides an objective and quantitative measurement of the quality of the design and its associated verification environment.

Certess has combined a technology known as mutation analysis with decades of experience in functional verification to create Certitude. Mutation analysis is based on the concept of introducing atomic changes called mutations in the HDL description of the design; if the change is not detected, it exposes a weakness in the design's verification environment. A number of innovative proprietary algorithms were developed by Certess to enable the exploitation of mutation analysis for the functional qualification of industrial systems.

About Certess

Certess, Inc. is the only electronic design automation company providing functional qualification products for companies that create and integrate complex design blocks or intellectual property (IP). The company's technology provides design and verification engineers with an objective way to evaluate and improve the completeness of the verification environment, resulting in a shorter and more predictable process to integrate SoC designs and ensure high quality designs. The company is headquartered in Campbell, CA. For additional information, see www.certess.com.

About ISS Group

Founded in 1986, the ISS Group provides leading-edge tools, services and solutions to the hi-tech industry of northern Europe. Situated in Stockholm, Sweden, they are in short - the gateway to Scandinavia. ISS delivers targeted solutions for electronic product lifecycle "hot spots" including: design, simulation, verification and test, with an extensive background in the telecom area. Simply put, the ISS goal is to ensure success from the first prototype through high-volume production. For more information, see the ISS Group web site at www.iss.se.

Certess, Certitude are trademarks of Certess, Inc. All other companies and products referenced herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.