SafeNet Receives Prestigious Frost & Sullivan Product Innovation Award

- SafeNet, Inc. (NASDAQ: SFNT), setting the standard for information security, today announced that the company has been awarded the 2006 Frost & Sullivan Award for Semiconductor Security Product Innovation. The Award recognizes SafeNet for demonstrating excellence in product innovation, development strategy and the ability to meet customer needs. SafeNet’s SafeXcel IP Inline Security Engine was recognized as a unique silicon-proven security solution that enables semiconductor OEMs to build robust Gigabit-level security processing into next-generation System on a Chip (SoC) designs while reducing design cost and time to market.

“In an environment of increasing security challenges, SafeNet has demonstrated a superior ability to deliver innovative yet cost-effective embedded security solutions for the networking and communications OEM market,” said Sivakumar Muthuramalingam, Industry Analyst, Frost & Sullivan. “This award also recognizes SafeNet’s unique approach in bringing to market not only robust hardware security components, but integrated hardware and software solutions that add significant value to OEM customers.“

Frost & Sullivan, a global leader in growth consulting, determines recipients of the annual Award by conducting customer surveys, extensive secondary research and interviews with key market participants. Criteria used to determine the Award recipient include product innovation, product development, and successful commercialization.

The Award-winning SafeXcel IP Inline Security Engine takes a significant step beyond traditional SoC security architectures by deploying micro-programmed hardware for full data plane packet classification, filtering, and flow processing for every packet. The result is superior data rates across all packet sizes and a significant reduction of general-purpose processor utilization for security functions.

The Frost & Sullivan Award also recognizes SafeNet’s successful product development strategies and the degree to which the product meets customer needs. SafeNet’s unique inline security engine has not only been made available to semiconductor vendors integrating advanced security processing into SoCs, but has also been implemented in SafeNet’s own SafeXcel-51xx line of next-generation security processors. The SafeXcel-51xx series provides the best value, most cost-effective high-speed security processors in the industry. The security chips, as well as the IP product, are fully integrated with SafeNet’s QuickSec VPN security software to provide customers with a complete security system solution.

“We are delighted to receive this prestigious Award for product innovation in the field of semiconductor security,” said Henk Pruim, vice president and general manager of SafeNet’s OEM Networking Division. “This Award truly underscores SafeNet’s leadership in product design and our commitment to delivering the most innovative semiconductor security solutions. We will continue to ensure that SafeNet’s OEM customers get the best and most complete security solutions in the industry. ”

SafeNet will be exhibiting at the Embedded System Conference in San Jose, April 4-6 2006, at booth # 3215, and will be showcasing for the first time a complete hardware/software system performance demo of the SafeXcel-5160 - the best priced high-speed security processor in the industry.

SafeNet OEM Networking Business Unit

SafeNet's comprehensive security systems are deployed by the world’s leading networking/communications OEMs, including AMD, Texas Instruments, Lucent Technologies, AMCC, Siemens, Hitachi, HP, Juniper Networks, Cisco Systems, and Samsung. The leading global semiconductor, telecommunications, enterprise, and wireless OEMs trust SafeNet’s best-in-class security solutions for their next-generation networking and communications solutions. SafeNet is the only vendor that provides complete and proven security systems, including QuickSec VPN security software, SafeXcel security processors, and silicon-proven semiconductor IP – delivering superior protection while reducing cost and time to market for our customers. For more information about SafeNet and the Frost & Sullivan Award, please visit http://www.safenet-inc.com/award.

About SafeNet, Inc.

SafeNet is a global leader in information security.  Founded more than 20 years ago, the company provides complete security utilizing its encryption technologies to protect communications, intellectual property and digital identities, and offers a full spectrum of products including hardware, software, and chips. UBS, Nokia, Fujitsu, Hitachi, ARM, Bank of America, NetGear, the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security, Adobe, Samsung, Texas Instruments, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service and scores of other customers entrust their security needs to SafeNet. For more information, visit www.safenet-inc.com

About Frost & Sullivan

Frost & Sullivan, a global growth consulting company, has been partnering with clients to support the development of innovative strategies for more than 40 years. The company’s industry expertise integrates growth consulting, growth partnership services and corporate management training to identify and develop opportunities. Frost & Sullivan serves an extensive clientele that includes Global 1000 companies, emerging companies and the investment community by providing comprehensive industry coverage that reflects a unique global perspective and combines ongoing analysis of markets, technologies, econometrics and demographics. For more information, visit www.frost.com.