ACTEL Corporation Licenses ARM Cortex-M3 Processor

Extended partnership builds on success of soft ARM7 family processor for FPGAs

MOUTAIN VIEW, CA AND CAMBRIDGE, UK – Oct. 4, 2006 – Actel Corporation (NASDAQ: ACTL) and ARM [(LSE: ARM); (NASDAQ: ARMHY)] today announced at the ARM Developers’ Conference, Santa Clara, Calif., that Actel, a leader in single-chip field-programmable gate arrays (FPGA), has licensed the ARM® Cortex™-M3 processor. The agreement further strengthens the partnership established in March 2005 between the companies, which resulted in Actel’s CoreMP7, a soft ARM7™ family processor core optimized for implementation in Actel’s FPGAs.  The combination of ARM and Actel technologies brings the flexibility, fast time-to-market, and low implementation cost of FPGAs to ARM users and others who previously could not justify the expense of ASIC implementation for their application. 

“Since its introduction last year, we have seen a great deal of interest in our CoreMP7 processor from companies across the globe, reflecting the desire for FPGA flexibility combined with an industry-standard processor architecture,” said Dennis Kish, senior vice president, sales and marketing, Actel. “Moving forward, we are committed to exploring current and next-generation ARM technologies that will continue to benefit our customers, thereby increasing the choices available and enabling designers to reduce costs and improve performance.”

The ARM Cortex-M3 processor is designed to provide a high-performance, low-cost solution that meets the needs of minimal memory implementation, reduced pin count and low-power consumption, while delivering outstanding computational performance and exceptional system response to interrupts.

“The ARM architecture, ARM quality and the ARM Connected Community has long been the choice of ASIC/ASSP designers. Through our partnership with Actel, we are successfully offering these advantages to FPGA designers, a previously unaddressed embedded community,” said Graham Budd, EVP and general manager, Processor Division, ARM. “Our continuing partnership with Actel further solidifies ARM’s commitment to building on its success in the FPGA market.”

About Actel

Actel Corporation is the leader in single-chip FPGA solutions. The company is traded on the NASDAQ National Market under the symbol ACTL and is headquartered at 2061 Stierlin Court, Mountain View, Calif., 94043-4655. For more information about Actel, visit http://www.actel.com.

About ARM

ARM designs the technology that lies at the heart of advanced digital products, from mobile, home and enterprise solutions to embedded and emerging applications. ARM’s comprehensive product offering includes 16/32-bit RISC microprocessors, data engines, 3D processors, digital libraries, embedded memories, peripherals, software and development tools, as well as analog functions and high-speed connectivity products. Combined with the company’s broad Partner community, they provide a total system solution that offers a fast, reliable path to market for leading electronics companies. More information on ARM is available at http://www.arm.com.

About the ARM Connected Community

The ARM Connected Community is a global network of companies aligned to provide a complete solution, from design to manufacture and end use, for products based on the ARM architecture. ARM offers a variety of resources to Community members, including promotional programs and peer-networking opportunities that enable a variety of ARM Partners to come together to provide end-to-end customer solutions. For more information, please visit http://www.arm.com/community.