Cypress and ADT Sign Joint R& Agreement; Joint Effort to Develop Software and Architectures for Next Generation PLDs.

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 8, 2000

Cypress Semiconductor Corp. (NYSE:CY) and Aplus Design Technologies, Inc. (ADT) announced today that they signed a multi-year agreement to collaborate on the research and development of architectures and software for Cypress's next-generation programmable logic offerings. The agreement is expected to produce a new family of high-performance, high-density architectures within two years and will put in place architectural modeling and evaluation capabilities that will make successive new PLD product development faster and more cost effective.

&uot;ADT's unique capabilities of providing layout-driven synthesis and mapping tools, and a flexible synthesis framework to model and evaluate multiple heterogeneous PLD architectures, match well with Cypress's need to develop next-generation PLD products in ultra-deep-submicron technologies,&uot; said Christopher Norris, vice president of Cypress's Programmable Logic Division. &uot;The high complexity of future generations of PLD products requires tightly coupled architecture and synthesis tool development. We believe that the combination of Cypress's strength in PLD design and manufacturing, and ADT's expertise in developing state-of-the art synthesis algorithms and tools, will lead to an exciting high-performance PLD product.&uot;

&uot;The interconnect delay has become an increasingly dominant factor in determining the performance of PLD products as the process technology scales further and more complex programmable interconnect structures are used,&uot; said Jason Cong, founder and president of ADT. &uot;A new generation of PLD design tools will need to provide tightly coupled synthesis and layout optimization for interconnect delay minimization, and new PLD architectures will need to take advantage of layout-driven synthesis capabilities.

&uot;Cypress's choice of ADT as its partner to develop the next-generation PLD products is the best testament of ADT's strength in providing advanced layout-driven synthesis tools and unique architecture-evaluation toolkits and services,&uot; Cong said.

About ADT

Aplus Design Technologies, Inc. (ADT), a start-up company founded in 1998, provides next-generation design automation tools for high-performance, high-density programmable logic devices (including both FPGAs and CPLDs) as well as architecture evaluation toolkits and services for developing new PLD products. The ADT tools offer Advanced Programmable Logic Unified Solutions (APLUS) which integrate synthesis and layout design and perform advanced optimization based on detailed architecture modeling. The ADT tools aim at providing at least one technology generation performance advantage over the existing design tools through tightly-coupled, architecture-specific synthesis and layout optimization. The company is located in Los Angeles, California, and its website is www.aplus-dt.com.

About Cypress

Cypress Semiconductor provides high-performance integrated circuit solutions &uot;By Engineers. For Engineers.(TM)&uot; for fast-growing companies in fast-growing markets, including data communications, telecommunications, computation, consumer products, and industrial-control. With a focus on emerging communications applications, Cypress's product lines include networking-optimized and micropower static RAMs; high-bandwidth multi-port and FIFO memories; high-density programmable logic devices; timing technology for PCs and other digital systems; and controllers for Universal Serial Bus (USB). Cypress is No. 1 in the USB and clock chip markets.

More than two-thirds of Cypress's sales come from fast-growing datacom/telecom markets and dynamic companies such as Lucent, Cisco, 3Com, Alcatel, Motorola, Ericsson, and Nortel Networks. Cypress's ability to mix and match its broad portfolio of intellectual property enables targeted, integrated solutions for high-speed systems that feed bandwidth-hungry Internet applications. Cypress aims to become the preferred silicon supplier for Internet switching systems and for every Internet data stream to pass through at least one Cypress IC.

Cypress employs more than 3,600 people worldwide with international headquarters in San Jose, California. Its shares are listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol CY. More information about Cypress is accessible electronically on the company's worldwide web site at http://www.cypress.com or by CD-ROM (call 1-800-858-1810). An electronic investor forum, and other investor information, is located at http://www.cypress.com/investor/index.html.

Note to Editors: &uot;Safe Harbor&uot; Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: Statements in this press release regarding Cypress's business that are not historical facts are &uot;forward-looking statements&uot; involving risks and uncertainties, including, but not limited to, market-acceptance risks, the effect of global economic conditions and shifts in supply and demand, the impact of competitive products and pricing, product development, commercialization and technological difficulties, and capacity and supply constraints.