HCL Tech appointed the first ‘SuperH Design Agency’

New Delhi February 5, 2003. HCL Technologies (HCL Tech), a leading global IT services company and SuperH, Inc., the leading supplier of multimedia reduced instruction set computing (RISC) central processing unit (CPU) cores, today announced that the two companies have signed an agreement enabling HCL Tech to become the first member of the ‘SuperH Design Agency’ program.

As a result of this agreement, HCL Tech will act as a licensing agency for SuperHTM cores enabling it to design and deliver System-on-Chip (SoC) devices incorporating SuperH multimedia CPU cores. The Design Agency Program is designed to offer System OEMs, fabless chip designers and IDMs (integrated device manufacturers) the option of a ‘one-stop-shop’ for SoC design services. HCL Tech will thus act as a single point of contact for specification, licensing and design services, thereby greatly simplifying the whole Intellectual Property (IP) delivery process.

The SuperH Design Agency Program complements the established SuperH Partner Program, which offers a range of IP, development tools, application software and services. The Partner Program is primarily targeted at licensees developing their own SoC devices, who intend to use the SuperH Partners to enhance their offering in specific areas.

Both organizations are pioneers in semiconductor IP and recognize the market need for a one-stop-shop for IP, coupled with an end-to-end design service for SoC devices. The combined strength of SuperH, Inc, with its RISC CPU and HCL Tech’s design services complemented by its IPs, make a compelling offering.

Commenting on this association, Anup Dutta, HCL Tech’s Head of VLSI & Embedded System Division said, “We have had a long-standing relationship with SuperH and are glad to progress to the next level of collaboration. The new arrangement will allow us to provide comprehensive solutions built around the SuperH cores and enable us to deliver significant value to our mutual customers”.

HCL Tech has been working on SuperH processor designs for over 8 years and this agreement is a natural outcome of the strong relationship between the two companies. HCL Tech has significant IPs developed in the areas of Automotive, Telecom and Wireless, PC and System Bus Architectures, RISC Processor Architectures etc., which will be available for integration into SoC devices. The company has already partnered with SuperH in the areas of System-on-chip (SoC) design, Software development and Design Services.

Primarily, the focus will be on applications requiring an integrated RISC CPU with a DSP core such as set-top-boxes, home gateways, in-car entertainment, handheld multimedia, data and voice communications. These can be addressed by the 32-bit SH-4 which integrates a RISC CPU with 128-bit vector floating point unit (FPU) and is ideally suited to running Digital Signal Processing (DSP) style algorithms for processing voice, audio and graphics data. The 64-bit SH-5 is upward compatible with the SH-4 and adds a comprehensive SIMD instruction set delivering excellent video performance. The SuperHywayTM bus offers a customizable, high performance on-chip interconnect system and SuperH supports an open source set of tools based on GNU (GNU is a recursive acronym for ‘GNU’s Not UNIX’) and Linux technologies. Jean-Marie Rolland, CEO at SuperH commented, “We have been successful in licensing our cores for multimedia applications and are delighted to have HCL Technologies as our first SuperH Design Agency. This is a key part of our sales strategy designed to take our processor technology to an even wider range of customers. We will be benefiting from the customer base and market reach of HCL Technologies”.

About SuperH, Inc.
SuperH, Inc. is semiconductor intellectual property (SIP) licensing company and is a leading supplier of multimedia RISC CPU cores to companies building System-on-Chip (SoC) products.

SuperH, Inc. develops RISC CPU cores, the SuperHyway on-chip interconnect and software development tools. The SuperHTM family today includes the 32-bit SH-4 and 64-bit SH-5 CPU cores and is ideally suited to multimedia applications that require a single CPU core executing a mix of general purpose code and DSP algorithms. SuperH CPU cores are targeted at consumer, automotive, telecom and handheld multimedia appliance markets with specific emphasis on set top box, residential gateway, car information systems, modems, digital camera and multimedia players.

Further information about SuperH, Inc. and SuperHTM products can be found at www.superh.com

About HCL Technologies
HCL Technologies is one of India’s leading global IT services and product engineering companies, providing value-added, software-led IT solutions and services to large and medium-scale organizations. Founded in 1991, HCL Tech focuses on technology as well as R&D outsourcing, with the objective of working with clients in areas at the core of their business. HCL Tech delivers these services through an extensive offshore software development infrastructure and a vast global marketing network, spanning 25 offices in 14 countries, that enables scalable, flexible and cost-effective delivery. The company’s well defined business strategy has enabled it to build domain expertise across a host of chosen verticals including banking, funds management, insurance, petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, aerospace, automotives, semi-conductors and retail.

As of 31 December 2002, HCL Tech along with its subsidiaries, had 7,788 employees. Together with its knowledge of embedded systems, core technologies and application development expertise, HCL Tech is positioned as a composite solutions provider equipped to cater to the entire gamut of IT needs. For more information, visit HCL Technologies at www.hcltech.com

Trademarks
SuperHTM is a trademark for products originally developed by Hitachi, Ltd. and is owned by Hitachi Ltd.
The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

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