Conexant Unveils Industry's Most Flexible Family of MPEG-2 Digital Broadcast Decoders for Cable, Satellite and Terrestrial Set-Top Boxes.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 5, 2003

Common Platform Minimizes Set-top Box Development Costs; Provides

Universal, Low-cost, High-performance Back-end Platform for Worldwide

Broadcast Networks

Conexant Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq:CNXT), a worldwide leader in semiconductor system solutions for communications applications, today introduced a new family of MPEG-2 (Moving Picture Experts Group) audio/video decoders for cable, satellite and terrestrial set-top boxes (STBs).

The CX24153/4/6 decoders provide consumer electronics manufacturers with a common platform on which to build cost-effective digital television STBs that support a broad array of applications ranging from basic free-to-air to pay television and interactive digital broadcast reception. Its flexible, common architecture also enables it to be used as a back-end platform that can interface to a variety of broadcast front-ends through a baseband transport stream interface.

"The combination of low-cost, advanced processing capabilities, graphics performance and versatility that our new decoder family offers is unsurpassed," said Jeffrey Crosby, vice president of Conexant's Set-top Box Products business. "We're pleased to offer our customers a low-cost, multi-purpose platform that enables them to leverage their hardware and software investments across multiple broadcast STBs and networks, and minimize their overall product development costs."

Conexant's decoders feature an innovative, unified memory architecture that reduces memory cost by supporting all system requirements in a single, low-cost memory chip. Implementing analog modem return path functionality in software running on a high-performance ARM920T RISC processor further minimizes system hardware costs.

Additional contributions to system bill-of-materials costs come from an integrated radio frequency modulator, voltage controlled crystal oscillator, system clock generation and digital video broadcast (DVB) common interface module controller, significantly reducing the number of external components that are required.

The high-performance embedded processor allows manufacturers to integrate feature-rich middleware platforms such as the Multimedia Home Platform (MHP) into low-cost STBs, supporting features such as improved interactive application loading and scrolling performance.

A powerful video/graphics display engine that supports up to five independent image planes enabling a rich visual user interface complements the ARM920. A full-featured two-dimensional graphics acceleration engine offloads on-screen display rendering tasks from the processor, increasing memory bandwidth and performance for intensive interactive applications.

A mature, full-featured STB hardware abstraction layer (HAL) software solution is available today for developers. It offers a rich set of common driver application program interface for a range of different real-time operating system (RTOS) and tool chain environments based on a common source code library that is designed for easy adaptation to multiple broadcaster specific platforms. Conexant also offers robust HAL solutions for select third-party interactive middleware platforms including OpenTV Core 1.0., OpenTV 1.2 and Alticast's Alticaptor MHP. The common HAL platform includes support for Nucleus+, VxWorks and pSOS RTOS kernels and is integrated with a reference STB hardware system.

Pricing and Availability

The CX24153/4/6 decoders are packaged in a compact 27mm ball grid array (BGA) and are priced at $15.00 in high-volume production quantities. The device is sampling now, with volume production scheduled for the third quarter of 2003.

About Conexant

Conexant Systems, Inc., a worldwide leader in semiconductor system solutions for communications applications, leverages its expertise in mixed-signal processing to deliver integrated systems and semiconductor products through two separate businesses.

The Broadband Communications business develops and delivers integrated semiconductor solutions that enable digital entertainment and information networks for the home and small office. Its product portfolio includes the building blocks required for bridging cable, satellite, and terrestrial data and digital video networks.

Mindspeed Technologies(TM), the company's Internet infrastructure business, designs, develops and sells semiconductor networking solutions for communications applications in enterprise, access, metropolitan and wide area networks. Conexant is headquartered in Newport Beach, Calif. To learn more, visit us at www.conexant.com or www.mindspeed.com.

Safe Harbor Statement

This press release contains statements relating to future results of Conexant (including certain projections and business trends) that are "forward-looking statements" as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those projected as a result of certain risks and uncertainties. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to: the cyclical nature of the semiconductor industry and the markets addressed by the company's and its customers' products; demand for and market acceptance of new and existing products; successful development of new products; the timing of new product introductions; the availability of manufacturing capacity; pricing pressures and other competitive factors; changes in product mix; product obsolescence; the ability to develop and implement new technologies and to obtain protection for the related intellectual property; the successful implementation of the company's expense reduction and restructuring initiatives; the successful separation of the company's Broadband Communications and Mindspeed Technologies(TM) businesses; the ability to attract and retain qualified personnel; and the uncertainties of litigation, as well as other risks and uncertainties, including those detailed from time to time in the company's Securities and Exchange Commission filings. These forward-looking statements are made only as of the date hereof, and the company undertakes no obligation to update or revise the forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

Note to Editors: Conexant and Mindspeed are trademarks of Conexant Systems, Inc. Other brands and names contained in this release are the property of their respective owners.