Accelerated Technology's Nucleus USB CCID Class Driver Provides USB Support for Smart Card Applications

MOBILE, Ala., May 11, 2005 - Accelerated Technology, a Mentor Graphics division (Nasdaq: MENT), today announced a new class driver for the Nucleus® USB software, which provides Universal Serial Bus (USB) support for the Nucleus Real-Time Operating System (RTOS). The Nucleus USB Chip/Smart Card Interface Device (CCID) class driver allows developers to quickly and easily build a standard USB interface without writing device-specific drivers to connect an embedded host to a variety of smart card readers.

Smart card technology is widely used as a popular way to store personal data and pay for goods. Over a third of a billion smart cards have been deployed in a variety of applications such as electronic purses, bankcards, online payment systems, retail, mobile phones, transportation and insurance cards. Because of this successful market penetration, a large number of smart card variants have evolved. This in turn has driven the need for smart card readers to support a growing list of smart card types.

However, if no uniform interface is available among the different smart card readers, an embedded system requires the development of a device-specific driver to access that particular smart card variant. Since the Nucleus USB CCID class driver incorporates the USB CCID standard, it enables the embedded host to interface with CCID-compliant smart card readers via a USB link, eliminating the need to develop a device-specific driver. Developers benefit from reduced driver development costs and time to market. It also allows them to provide their customers with devices compliant with the USB CCID specification, which is important to maintain compatibility among devices from different manufacturers.

"The Nucleus USB CCID class driver support makes the integration in an existing system the easiest ever by connecting the embedded host and smart card reader without the need for an additional driver. It also helps businesses evolve and expand their products and services in a changing global marketplace by offering customers to easily and securely access the smart card based transactions and applications," said Robert Day, director of marketing, Embedded Systems Division, Mentor Graphics.

Availability and Pricing

The Nucleus embedded software is licensed with source code and without royalty fees. Available now, licenses for the Nucleus USB software start at U.S. $14,995 and licenses for the class drivers begin at U.S. $2,995. The new Nucleus USB CCID class driver has been released for use with the Nucleus USB host stack software, which is USB 1.1 and USB 2.0 compliant. For more information, please contact Accelerated Technology at 800-468-6853 or info@acceleratedtechnology.com.  

About Mentor Graphics

Mentor Graphics Corporation (Nasdaq: MENT) is a world leader in electronic hardware and software design solutions, providing products, consulting services and award-winning support for the world's most successful electronics and semiconductor companies. Established in 1981, the company reported revenues over the last 12 months of over $700 million and employs approximately 3,850 people worldwide. Corporate headquarters are located at 8005 S.W. Boeckman Road, Wilsonville, Oregon 97070-7777; Silicon Valley headquarters are located at 1001 Ridder Park Drive, San Jose, California 95131-2314. World Wide Web site: http://www.mentor.com/.

Accelerated Technology, a division of Mentor Graphics Corporation, is located in Mobile, Alabama and has engineering sites, sales offices and distributors worldwide. As a leading provider of royalty-free, embedded real-time operating system (RTOS) software, Accelerated Technology helps developers accelerate product time-to-market in a wide range of embedded device applications. Its comprehensive Nucleus RTOS includes a high-level UML suite, graphical prototyping tools, kernels, middleware and Eclipse-based development tools. For more information, please visit www.acceleratedtechnology.com or e-mail us at info@acceleratedtechnology.com.

Mentor Graphics, Accelerated Technology and Nucleus are registered trademarks of Mentor Graphics Corporation. All other company or product names are the registered trademarks or trademarks of their respective owners.