Conexant and Mindspeed Sign Multi-Year Licensing Deal With Sagantec

LAS VEGAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 18, 2001--Sagantec of Fremont, Calif. today announced that Conexant Systems Inc. (Nasdaq:CNXT) and its Internet infrastructure business, Mindspeed Technologies(TM), have signed a licensing agreement for Sagantec's custom physical implementation products which include Companion, Hurricane, SiClone & DREAM.

The businesses will use the Sagantec software to develop their world class personal networking and internet infrastructure IC technologies.

Sagantec's products have allowed Conexant to create and completely verify custom ARM processor cores in a new technology in a very short timeframe. The results at both 0.18 and 0.15 micron processes not only were 22 percent smaller than what could be achieved by comparable methodologies, but the Sagantec methodology also provided control of electrical performance by transistor and wire sizing -- a level of control that is not possible with a layout shrink.

``Our ability to quickly implement highly integrated system on a chip designs in new fabrication technologies is a critical factor in our business. Sagantec's tool suite, as well as their extensive technical support, will be invaluable in exploiting new market opportunities,''said Mojy Chian, vice president, Core Technologies Group for Mindspeed.

``In a competitive market, full custom building blocks such as high speed/low power embedded CPUs , specialized memories or analog transceivers are the key elements that create a highly integrated product with differentiated added value,'' said Coby Zelnik, senior vice president, business development at Sagantec.`` However, full custom physical implementation has traditionally been the weakest link in the SoC design process. Our approach enables customers to accelerate and automate this critical task and Conexant's and Mindspeed's selection of Sagantec is a true testimony to the value of our products.''

Sagantec Product Overview:

Sagantec's products are focused on automating and accelerating physical design, technology implementation and physical optimization of full custom integrated circuits. These tools are used by designers of high performance CPUs and DSPs, memory ICs and embedded memories, and analog/mixed-signal ICs.

The Sagantec product line includes:

SiClone, a full custom layout migration and optimization tool. With its simultaneous, n-level hierarchy processing, SiClone can migrate, re-map, compact and optimize complex, hierarchical custom layout design blocks, such as high performance datapaths, custom control, memory arrays and peripherals. SiClone can also migrate analog and mixed-signal design blocks using a set of analog specific features.

Hurricane, a high-capacity, high-speed layout compaction and migration tool. Hurricane can compact large custom-routed physical blocks, squeezing out unused spaces and making them denser and smaller. When used for process migration, Hurricane can handle large IP blocks and can flatten them to create the densest possible result.

Companion, an interactive custom layout design acceleration tool. Companion integrates a powerful physical design-rule application and compaction engine with the Virtuoso XL layout editor and the Virtuoso Custom Designer from Cadence Design Systems (NYSE:CDN).

DREAM, this tool enables reuse and automatic retargeting of physical cell libraries to new process technologies, and generates new GDS2 files conforming to the new design rules. It optimizes the layout for deep submicron technology while keeping the underlying physical architecture and topology intact.

About Sagantec

Sagantec provides software, methodologies and services that enable rapid implementation reuse and design closure for full custom physical designs in sub-wavelength technologies. The company is working closely with its semiconductor partners and customers to ensure that its products work with the most aggressive technologies of 0.13 micron and below. Sagantec products are specifically designed to accelerate the physical design process of high performance/low power CPUs, and DSPs, dedicated and embedded memories, and analog/mixed-signal circuits. Privately held and funded, Sagantec was founded in 1993 in Israel. Its Corporate headquarters for sales, marketing, technical services and applications organization is located at 46485 Landing Parkway, Fremont, Calif. 94538. Telephone: 510/360-5200. Facsimile: 510/360-5255. On the web at: http://www.sagantec.com.

Note to Editors: Sagantec acknowledges trademarks or registered trademarks of other organizations for their respective products and services.