TeraConnect and Mindspeed Test and Prove Interoperability of Optical Components.

Business/Technology Editors

SUPERCOMM 2002

Booth #10513

NASHUA, N.H.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 30, 2002

Switch, Router and Server OEMs Now Have Assurance

of Compatibility of Optical and Electrical Devices in the Backplane 

TeraConnect, Inc., a technology leader in optical components, and Mindspeed Technologies(TM), the Internet infrastructure business of Conexant Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CNXT), today announced that TeraConnect's 48-channel opto-electronic interconnect and Mindspeed's serializer/deserializer (Ser/Des) device have been tested and are proven for compatibility in server, router and switch backplanes. With testing completed, OEMs are assured that next generation designs including opto-electronic interconnects and Ser/Des transceivers will interoperate, allowing for high performance and high reliability at the lowest cost per transmitted bit of data.

"Interconnect density and low power consumption are critical to our customers," said Mindspeed Director of Marketing, Elie Massabki. "The combination of TeraConnect's TeraLink(TM) modules and Mindspeed's SkyRail SerDes transceivers results in the most compact, lowest power and highest capacity optical link in the industry."

According to TeraConnect Vice President of Marketing, John Langevin, "The interoperability of these products is a logical next step for our customers as we bring our industry leading interconnect products to market. We've fully tested our transmit and receive modules with Mindspeed's serializer/deserializer devices and are confident that this will ease the design limitations of our customers and better serve them as they bring dense, efficient and reliable next generation networks to market."

Interoperability Test Results

TeraConnect thoroughly characterized the backplane solution and interoperability between Mindspeed's M27211 Octal SkyRail SerDes device and TeraConnect's TeraLink(TM)-48 parallel optical interconnect modules. The characterization consisted of testing under stressed patterns of Ethernet and Fibre-Channel, Infiniband, 10 Gigabit Ethernet and SONET data. Engineers conducted the test through 100 meters of 62.5-micron optical cable, achieving a Bit-Error-Rate (BER) lower than 1x10(-12) in all cases.

TeraConnect, in collaboration with Mindspeed, has developed a white paper -- Building 150+ Gbps Optical Backplanes -- addressing technology design, testing methodology and performance measurement of components in the optical backplane of high-performance computing and communications equipment. The white paper will be available on TeraConnect's website at www.teraconnect.com/reg.html, and at the upcoming SUPERCOMM trade show in Atlanta, GA, June 4-6, 2002, at the TeraConnect booth #10513.

Mindspeed's M27211 Octal SkyRail transceiver delivers a range of bandwidth from 1 to 3.4 Gbps per channel, enabling 27.2 Gbps of bandwidth over all eight channels and consuming only 1.6 Watts of power. The M27211 integrates eight transmitters and receivers, serializers and deserializers, clock-and-data recovery, synthesis circuits, 8B/10B encoders/decoders, termination resistors, and channel alignment/de-skewing circuitry.

TeraConnect's TeraLink family of parallel optic products consists of independent transmit and receive modules configured in 24 and 48 channel interconnects operating at more than 150 Gbps at 3.2 Gbps per channel. Targeted to the high-performance computing and communications market, TeraConnect is shipping the market's densest fiber optic interconnects for commercial deployment to router, server and switch OEMs.

About TeraConnect

Launched in the fourth quarter of 2000, Nashua, New Hampshire- based TeraConnect is the leading provider of high performance, two-dimensional opto-electronic (2DOE) components for the high-speed router, server and telecommunications infrastructure markets. Based on core technology developed at BAE Systems (formerly Sanders, a Lockheed Martin Company), TeraConnect devices eliminate the bottlenecks that currently limit data transmission between digital platforms, enabling greater throughput in advanced communications and computing equipment. TeraConnect has been funded by Goldman Sachs, Kodiak Venture Partners and Spectrum Equity Investors. For more information, please visit http://www.teraconnect.com.

About Conexant

Conexant Systems, Inc. is a worldwide leader in semiconductor system solutions for communications applications. Conexant leverages its expertise in mixed-signal processing to deliver integrated systems and semiconductor products through three separate businesses that address the wireless communications, broadband access and Internet infrastructure markets. Conexant's wireless communications business is focused on providing power amplifiers, radio-frequency subsystems and complete systems solutions. The broadband access business develops and delivers integrated solutions that enable digital entertainment and information networks for the home and small office. Mindspeed Technologies, the company's Internet infrastructure business, designs, develops and sells a complete portfolio of semiconductor networking solutions that facilitate the aggregation, transmission and switching of data, video and voice from the edge of the Internet to linked metropolitan area networks and long-haul networks. Conexant, headquartered in Newport Beach, Calif., delivered revenues of $1.1 billion for fiscal 2001. The company is a member of the S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 indices. To learn more, visit us at www.conexant.com or www.mindspeed.com.