Nethra Licenses Tensilica's Diamond 108Mini Core Processor for Mobile Handset Imaging

SANTA CLARA, CA – October 3, 2006 – Tensilica, Inc. today announced that Nethra Imaging, a privately held developer of imaging solutions for consumer applications, has licensed the Diamond Standard 108Mini processor core as the main system controller for its upcoming mobile handset imaging chip design.

“We picked Tensilica’s Diamond 108Mini over other processor cores because of the small code size, small area and ease of integration into our product development environment,” said Murty Bhavana, Nethra’s vice president of marketing. "Image and video capture and processing require very high performance imaging algorithms. Using a Diamond 108Mini to provide a high performance processor core, our customers will have enough headroom to add their IP and provide product differentiation."

The Diamond 108Mini is a fully synthesizable low-power 32-bit RISC CPU controller core. Although the Diamond 108Mini is smaller in die area than other 32-bit CPUs, its performance is extremely high. It is capable of handling any control-plane application where minimal die area is the most important system design parameter, although advanced debugging features are supported.

“Nethra already has several design wins with large Japanese and Korean cell phone image module manufacturers, and their second-generation chips that will include our Diamond 108Mini appear to be ideally positioned for the transition to higher quality digital cameras built into cell phone handsets,” stated Steve Roddy, Tensilica’s vice president of marketing.

About Nethra

Nethra Imaging is a privately held semiconductor company focused on delivering imaging solutions for a wide range of digital consumer applications. The company uses proprietary algorithms to build flexible, fully programmable image processor chips for mobile imaging and PC video capture applications. Incorporated in 2003, Nethra is located in Cupertino, Calif., and began full operations in January 2004. The company's leaders are a team of established entrepreneurs with a wealth of experience in imaging and silicon development. Nethra is venture-backed and entered the market in 2005 with a family of image processors for the rapidly growing mobile handset camera market. For more information, visit www.nethra.us.com.

About Tensilica

Tensilica offers the broadest line of controller, CPU and specialty DSP processors on the market today, in both an off-the-shelf format via the Diamond Standard Series cores and with full designer configurability with the Xtensa processor family. Tensilica’s low-power, benchmark proven processors have been designed into high-volume products at industry leaders in the digital consumer, networking and telecommunications markets. All Tensilica processor cores are complete with a matching software development tool environment, portfolio of system simulation models, and hardware implementation tool support. For more information on Tensilica's patented approach to the creation of application-specific building blocks for SOC design, visit www.tensilica.com.