Cognex Machine Vision Selected by Leading Manufacturer of Inspection Systems for Packaging Industry.

Business Editors

NATICK, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 15, 2003

Cognex Corporation (NASDAQ: CGNX), the world's leading supplier of machine vision systems, announced today that Inex Vision Systems, a leading supplier of automated inspection solutions for the consumer packaging industry, will integrate Cognex machine vision into their InSpect 100 and InSpect 500 package inspection systems.

Inex Vision Systems designs, manufactures and installs consumer packaging inspection systems that are specially configured for each customer's application needs and manufacturing environment. The InSpect 100 and 500 machines are general-purpose systems that can be deployed at various points on a packaging line to perform such tasks as detecting presence/absence, verifying assembly, or checking label integrity. Inex will rely on Cognex's In-Sight vision sensors to provide the systems' core vision capability.

"After evaluating several leading machine vision suppliers, Inex selected Cognex because of the range of machine vision products that they offered, the depth of their technology, and because of Cognex's long and successful history of being a responsive and reliable partner to specialized machinery builders such as Inex," said Glen Long, President of Inex Vision Systems.

"By using Cognex for their core vision technology instead of dedicating internal resources for this purpose, Inex can free their own engineers to focus on creating high-performance packaging applications for their customers," said Dr. Robert J. Shillman, Cognex's CEO and Chairman. "The collaboration between Cognex and Inex leverages both the strength of Cognex's robust vision technology and Inex's deep knowledge of the consumer packaging industry."

Inex Vision Systems, one of the largest suppliers of glass inspections systems in the world, is a multi-million dollar company that manufactures product inspection systems that perform a wide range of tasks, from verifying label integrity, cap closure, and fill level to performing case inspection and verifying package integrity. Inex is a division of the German-based IWKA Group, an international network of companies with combined annual revenues in excess of 2 billion Euros, that focuses on providing production systems for the automotive, consumer goods, and energy industries.

Cognex Corporation designs, develops, manufactures, and markets machine vision systems, or computers that can "see." Cognex is the world's leader in the machine vision industry, having shipped more than 175,000 vision systems, representing over $1.4 billion in cumulative revenue, since the company's founding in 1981. Cognex's Modular Vision Systems Division, headquartered in Natick, Massachusetts, specializes in machine vision systems which are used for automating the manufacture of a wide range of discrete items and for assuring their quality. Cognex's Surface Inspection Systems Division, headquartered in Alameda, California, specializes in machine vision systems which are used for inspecting the surfaces of products manufactured in a continuous fashion, such as metals, paper, plastics, and nonwovens. In addition to its corporate headquarters in Natick, Massachusetts, Cognex also has regional offices located throughout North America, Japan, Europe, and Southeast Asia. Visit Cognex on-line at http://www.cognex.com.