Green Hills Software Scores Three-Peat in Third Running of EEMBC Benchmarks.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

SANTA BARBARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 12, 2000

Green Hills' Compilers Produce Best Results on

13 of the 28 Posted Scores -- No Other Compiler Wins More Than Five

Green Hills Software today announced that its optimizing C compilers have prevailed again in the third running of the EEMBC (EDN Embedded Microprocessor Benchmark Consortium) benchmarks.

The win marks the third straight time that Green Hills has prevailed in the running of the EEMBC benchmarks. Green Hills' compilers took top honors at the 1999 Embedded Processor Forum when EEMBC published its first results, and again in April of this year when EEMBC posted its second-round results. All results are publicly available at www.eembc.org.

The benchmark categories for the third release of the EEMBC benchmarks were automotive/industrial, consumer, networking, office automation, and telecom. Green Hills' compilers were used in 13 of the 28 benchmark results reported by EEMBC for 32 and 64-bit processors. No other compiler figured in more than five of the 23 posted scores.

"That makes a three-peat for our compilers in the EEMBC benchmarks," said John Carbone, vice president of marketing at Green Hills Software. "The EEMBC benchmarks prove what processor vendors and programmers have known all along, that Green Hills makes the best optimizing compilers in the business."

"The EEMBC benchmarks may have been created to test processor performance and efficiency," added Carbone. "But, processor vendors typically run the benchmarks with several different compilers to achieve the best possible results. Thus, the EEMBC benchmarks are as much a test of compiler performance and efficiency as they are of processor performance and efficiency."

Processor vendors selected Green Hills' compilers over other compilers in order to achieve the highest possible speed and smallest possible code size on the EEMBC benchmarks. Green Hills C/C++ compilers performed particularly well with NEC and Toshiba processors. NEC used Green Hills' compilers to post results for its V832 and VR5074 processors automotive, consumer, networking, office automation, and telecom applications. Toshiba used Green Hills' C/C++ compiler to post results for its TMP3927F processor in the EEMBC office automation and networking benchmarks.

EEMBC was founded in 1997 to develop a set of real-world benchmarks for the embedded industry that system designers could use to evaluate microprocessors and vendors could use to help improve the performance and functionality of their microprocessors. Unlike established benchmarks like the Dhrystones, which attempt to evaluate fundamental processor attributes through a handful of relatively short core routines, the EEMBC benchmarks provide a better gauge of real-world performance by utilizing real applications (wherever possible) that have been developed for a variety of industries, including consumer electronics, automotive, and telecom.

Processor vendors who want to use the EEMBC benchmarks to evaluate the performance of their microprocessors, microcontrollers, and DSPs become members of EEMBC, which gives them access to the benchmark source code. They then select a compiler to convert the EEMBC source code into machine code for their particular processor.

The EEMBC Certification Laboratories (ECL) validates the results by running the benchmarks on that processor using the same compiler and system configuration. RTOS and compiler vendors who want to use the EEMBC benchmarks to improve their tools, and end users who want to use the benchmarks to aid in the selection of processors and tools, can also gain access to the benchmark source code by becoming EEMBC members.

Green Hills Software offers C/C++ compilers and a complete integrated development environment (MULTI(R) 2000) for most EEMBC member company processors, the broadest processor coverage available in the industry. Vendors who want to run the EEMBC benchmarks on their processor with an off-the-shelf Green Hills compiler (not optimized for EEMBC) can do so free of charge.

Green Hills will also work with vendors to produce EEMBC-optimized versions of its compilers for particular processors. Given EEMBC benchmarks' relevance to real-world applications, these EEMBC optimizations actually benefit real-world applications, not just the benchmarks themselves.

Green Hills Software was the first third-party compiler suppliers to license the EEMBC benchmarks, and is in the process of enhancing its compilers to run the benchmarks even more efficiently. Because the EEMBC benchmarks are based on real-world code, Green Hills expects that compiler enhancements made to improve EEMBC performance will also carry through to a broad range of embedded applications not related to EEMBC.

"Green Hills Software has been very helpful in supporting the EEMBC benchmark process," said Markus Levy, president of EEMBC. "The consortium looks forward to Green Hills' continued involvement in helping EEMBC develop new and improved versions of the EEMBC benchmarks for the embedded industry."

Green Hill Software's family of C, C++, EC++, Ada95, Pascal and FORTRAN compilers, together with the MULTI 2000 Integrated Development Environment, automate all aspects of embedded software development. Featuring a window-oriented, RTOS-aware source-level debugger, MULTI also provides a graphical program builder, run-time error checker, performance profiler, real-time event analyzer, and source/version control. MULTI also provides instruction set simulators for most major microprocessors that enable programmers to develop code without having access to target hardware.

More on Green Hills

Incorporated in 1982, Green Hills Software Inc., is a leading supplier of royalty-free real-time operating systems and software development tools for 32- and 64-bit embedded systems. Green Hills' royalty-free ThreadX(R) and INTEGRITY(TM) real-time operating systems, fully integrated with its market leading compilers and MULTI(R) integrated development environment, provide a total development and run-time solution that addresses both deeply embedded and high-reliability applications.

Green Hills Software is headquartered in Santa Barbara, with international headquarters in the United Kingdom. For more information on Green Hills Software products, please call 805/965-6044 or email inquiries to [e-mail]. http://www.ghs.com.