Cradle Secures Multiple Design Wins and Partnerships.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 4, 2003

Company's Communications and Media Processing Products Speed

Delivery of Next Generation VoIP, Wireless Routers, Integrated

Voice and Data Communications, and Video Surveillance Devices

Primed with a recent cash infusion and an expanded management team, Cradle Technologies has landed key design wins with two Taiwanese system companies, KCodes Corporation and Kingtronic Security Corporation. In addition, Cradle announced two development partnerships with Taiwan's Institute of Information Industry and the Computer and Communications Laboratory of the Industrial Technology Research Institute (CCL/ITRI). Today's news provides clear evidence that Cradle's Software Scaleable Systems on a Chip (3SOC(TM)) based Enhanced Communications Engines (ECE(TM)) and Media Processing Engines (MPE(TM)) are viable alternatives to fixed function devices and custom ASICs for a wide range of system applications.

Cradle's products allow system developers to shift all functions and interfaces into software, resulting in highly flexible Soft-Silicon(TM) solutions that realize rapid time to market, maximize system flexibility and minimize development costs.

KCodes Selects Cradle for Price/Performance Gains

The agreement between KCodes and Cradle highlights the development of a voice over IP gateway, a video IP phone, and a wireless VPN router, all based on Cradle's ECE products. The agreement also contained commitments to a minimum undisclosed amount of production unit shipments beginning in the second half of 2003. "Cradle's ECE solution significantly reduces the hardware design costs because all our system functions reside on one chip. Shifting functions into software also allows KCodes to amortize the cost of developing intellectual property across our first three products and positions us well for derivative product development as we expand our Original Development Manufacturer business," says Dr. Zekai Hsiau, President of KCodes Corporation.

Kingtronic Speeds Time to Market with Cradle Solution

The agreement between Kingtronic Security and Cradle highlights the development of an MPEG 4 video surveillance gateway based on a Cradle MPE product and a secure home gateway based on a Cradle ECE product. "The critical element in our decision to engage with Cradle was time to market. The availability of standard system functions royalty free from Cradle, and their mature tool set allows us to focus on developing our own software for differentiation and rapidly bringing our solutions to market. A big bonus is that we can purchase off the shelf Cradle chips instead of developing ASICs, which allows us to maintain our cost targets while also supporting the unique requirements, especially for the video surveillance gateway," says Larry Chang, CEO of Kingtronic Security.

The first customer for the video surveillance gateway is Taiwan Secom Corporation, a Taiwan based affiliate of Secom Corporation, the giant Asia based Security Company. Taiwan Secom will provide their surveillance centers with real time video feeds sent over the Internet from their remote client sites so that false alarms can be differentiated more easily from real ones. "While video based surveillance is quite effective, it is often too expensive for most of our customers. The Cradle chip is the only solution available that combines video and speech codecs onto a single chip with other system functionality such as IP processing. This allows us to scale deployment within the budgets of our customers," says Conrad Chen, CTO of Taiwan Secom.

Institute of Information Leverages Cradle's Easy to Use Tools and Software

The partnership agreement with the Institute for Information Industry centers on the delivery of system level reference design solutions for secure routers and integrated voice and data communications products. "The flexibility of Cradle's approach is ideal for the many applications that Taiwan companies are developing. Equally important though is Cradle's decision to license the software it develops royalty free, which allows our organization to create its own intellectual property in concert with Cradle and yet maintain a licensing structure for our customers that we already have in place. This is particularly important because as communications systems integrate more and more functionality, we can deliver state of the art solutions with reasonable royalties paid per system," says Jyh-Sheng Ke, Vice President of the Institute for Information Industry.

Cradle Is An Ideal Alternative To Developing ASICs

The agreement with CCL/ITRI covers research and development work around wireless based gateways and digital video products. Cradle's Soft-Silicon systems development approach is an ideal solution for increasing the return on research and development investments. "Since we are a research institute we can benefit greatly from reducing the number of ASICs we need to develop across our many projects. Also, because the Cradle chips are priced to accommodate high volume applications, our customers can limit the modifications necessary to make a commercially viable product when they license our research work," says Dr. Sheng-Ching Jeng Director of the Digital Video and Optical Communications Technologies Division at CCL/ITRI.

About Cradle

Cradle, a next generation Soft-Silicon(TM) semiconductor company, supplies Software Scalable System On a Chip (3SOC(TM)) based devices, application level software and easy to use development tools optimized for packet/stream processing applications that have demanding scalability requirements. Cradle provides Enhanced Communications Engines (ECE(TM)) for applications that require their packet streams to be opened and digitally processed as well as forwarded or routed, such as secure data transmission, voice over IP, and video conferencing applications. Cradle also provides Media Processing Engines (MPE(TM)) for applications that require real time color frame processing, such as multifunction printers, video IP phones, and advanced video surveillance equipment. Cradle enables customers to develop highly flexible Soft-Silicon solutions that realize rapid time to market, maximize product flexibility and minimize development costs. When applied across a full product line, Soft-Silicon solutions significantly streamline entire operations and manufacturing, resulting in higher revenues, lower operational risks, and higher gross profit margins. More information on Cradle Technologies can be found at www.cradle.com.