Octasic's OCT6100 Echo Cancellation Algorithm Passes Comprehensive Tests Set by BT Exact's Experts.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

MONTREAL--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 17, 2003

Octasic Inc., a fabless semiconductor vendor delivering innovative silicon solutions for the telecommunications infrastructure market, today announced that its echo canceller chip has completed a comprehensive test program at BT Exact, BT's research, technology and IT operations business. Octasic's OCT6100 Series of Echo Cancellation and Voice Quality Enhancement devices successfully completed all of BT Exact's expert assessment tests, with 98.6% of the tests resulting in the highest rating possible. The tests were selected based on BT Exact's extensive experience of delivering carrier-grade networks and services to determine the product's ability to meet the expectations of network operators and service providers.

Independent subjective assessment by BT Exact is an important step for vendors looking to have their technology deployed by service providers. Successful completion of these tests demonstrates the 'carrier grade' credentials of the product and confirms that networks using the OCT6100 Series of echo cancellation devices will allow service providers to offer superior voice quality to their customers as they migrate to next generation networks.

"We're pleased that these independent test results validate our efforts to develop a revolutionary algorithm that sets the standard for superior quality and performance in echo cancellation and voice quality solutions," said Frederic Bourget, Senior Product Manager, Octasic Inc. "BT Exact is recognized worldwide as a pioneer in communications technology research and innovation, and our product's successful completion of their test program represents an important milestone for Octasic and its customers."

Bob Reeves from BT Exact who is a leading world expert on echo control and rapporteur in the ITU-T SG15 stated: "Octasic have developed an echo canceller that maintains its audio transparency under the rigorous network conditions that BT Exact uses as part of its comprehensive assessment procedures. Based on our expert assessment, the performance of Octasic's echo canceller is comfortably above the acceptability threshold for inclusion in carrier class networks."

The expert assessment tests were conducted by a team of specialists from BT Exact with extensive knowledge in degradations introduced by echo cancellers. In a variety of conversation scenarios these specialists evaluated performance in single-talk and double-talk steady state and convergence periods. The scenarios covered multiple aspects of calls such as delays, Echo Return Loss (ERL) and a variety of background noises at different levels. Additional behaviors of the OCT6100, such as avoidance of temporal clipping or background noise modulation, were also evaluated. The results of the tests showed that no adverse effects were introduced by the echo canceller.

About the OCT6100 Series

The OCT6100 products are available today and address the needs of a variety of network equipment providers within the wireless, VoP, and TDM segments of the telecommunications industry. Each chip in the OCT6100 Series is a complete, easily integrated solution with extremely low power and space requirements, thereby simplifying design and reducing time-to-market. Devices are available in densities of 128, 256, 512, or 672 channels, with 64 or 128 ms tail echo cancellation available for all capacities. In addition to providing superior echo cancellation, all OCT6100 devices include high quality noise matching, manual gain control, adaptive level control, acoustic echo control, and G.168 tone detection. Other devices in the series are available with features such as: adaptive noise reduction, advanced tone detection, tone generation, full way conferencing, announcement playback, and ADPCM compression.

About Octasic

Founded in 1998, Octasic is a fabless semiconductor company based in Montreal, Canada. It designs, markets, and supports best-in-class silicon solutions for the next generation telecommunications infrastructure market. Octasic's innovative approach involves voice processors that are optimized to perform key voice functions such as echo cancellation, packetization, TFO, and compression. These specialized, high-density devices allow communications equipment providers to benefit from optimal scalability, and unmatched performance in terms of density, cost, and power consumption.

For more information about Octasic and its products, please visit www.octasic.com, or email [e-mail] to locate your local representative.

About BT Exact

BT Exact combines carrier grade telecommunications engineering and leading-edge network design, IT system and application development skills with extensive expertise in business consulting and human factors. It applies this knowledge to help its customers in BT Group, and selected other businesses, gain maximum advantage from their investments in communications networks and IT systems, develop new capabilities and open new opportunities.

BT Exact brings together the technological expertise of BT's research laboratories and the operational experience of the teams that design and operate BT's IT systems. Backed by a team of over 6,000 technologists, it is active and influential in setting global standards.

BT Exact builds on the insights and expertise developed by its research to address the demands of the next-generation internet, as well as advanced data services, information and network security, and software systems to support communications networks worldwide. BT Exact has people based worldwide - including locations across the UK and in Asia, continental Europe, and North America.

For more information about BT Exact, please go to www.BT Exact.com

Octasic is a registered trademark of Octasic Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective manufacturers.