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WILSONVILLE, Ore.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 20, 2001-- Solidifying its position as the number one co-verification solutions provider, Mentor Graphics Corp. (Nasdaq:MENT) today announced that it is the first to reach agreement with Texas Instruments (NYSE:TI) to deliver co-verification Processor Support Packages (PSPs) for Texas Instruments Digital Support Processor (DSP) and microcontroller solutions.

With the Mentor Graphics® Seamless® Co-Verification Environment(TM) (CVE), systems developers incorporating the near-universal Texas Instruments DSPs can now validate hardware/software interfaces in a virtual prototype prior to design fabrication. The process helps to ensure first-pass silicon success and helps to avoid costly and time-consuming silicon re-spins. Texas Instruments DSPs play a critical role in a variety of applications, like handheld devices, wireless infrastructure and desktop peripherals, where first-pass tape-out is often the difference between product success and failure.

Industry Leaders Respond to Customer Demand

The agreement comes in response to mutual customer demand for increased collaboration on co-verification technology between the two companies. To support widespread Seamless usage at Texas Instruments, Seamless PSPs have become a standard element in the model creation process for Texas Instruments DSP solutions. The agreement is a natural extension of making the models available to customers designing Texas Instruments DSPs into their products. There is a tight dependency between Seamless and Texas Instruments DSP PSPs, so this new arrangement provides customers with a dedicated, central source for co-verification technical support and process support packages from Mentor Graphics.

``A single point of ownership for co-verification package distribution, marketing and support is a clear win for our customers,'' said Rich Scales, Compiler/Simulation Technology product manager, DSP Software Development Systems, at Texas Instruments. ``In Mentor Graphics, our valued DSP customers gain a dedicated co-verification partner that can provide the level of support expected from an industry leader.''

The PSPs sold and supported by Mentor Graphics have been verified against Texas Instruments' proprietary test suites to ensure accuracy. The DSP PSPs support Texas Instruments' proprietary Code Composer Studio tools, already familiar to software engineers designing applications for Texas Instruments DSPs. The PSPs work with all popular logic simulation platforms, including Model Technology's ModelSim® simulation product, and are compatible with the extensive library of PSPs already available from Mentor Graphics for use in multi-processor systems.

``With the industry move to platform based design methodologies, a key push for our division this year will be to provide co-verification support for all key ingredients of system level integration platforms,'' said Serge Leef, general manager of the SoC Verification Business Unit at Mentor Graphics. ``We already provide comprehensive support for the industry leading embedded processors in PowerPC, MIPS and ARM. Adding support for TI DSPs allows us to deliver early platform verification solutions that will dramatically improve our customers' ability to validate complete systems.''

The PSPs are based on Texas Instruments' existing instruction set simulators, and interfaced to the Mentor Graphics Seamless CVE(TM) through an adaptor layer. PSPs included in the initial agreement model the c27x, c54x, c55x, c62x Texas Instruments DSPs along with the ARM925 microcontroller core. Further PSPs will be added, as they become available from Texas Instruments.

Mentor Graphics Leads Co-Verification Market

In related news, Mentor Graphics also announced that it leads the hardware/software co-verification market with a 66 percent market share according to the most recent Gartner Group/Dataquest study on the EDA industry, ``EDA 2000: Sorting Through the Confusion (11/20/2000)''. Gartner Dataquest predicts hardware/software co-verification as one of the fastest-growing EDA markets at a 36.2 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR).

Availability and Pricing

For information on pricing and availability of Texas Instruments DSP PSPs or to register for upcoming Seamless workshops and seminars, visit the Seamless web site at www.mentor.com/seamless.

About Seamless

Combining the best in embedded software development tools with logic simulation, the Mentor Graphics Seamless co-verification environment delivers high performance co-verification months before a hardware prototype can be built. The Seamless environment enables software and hardware development to be parallel activities, removing the software from the critical path, and reducing the risk of hardware prototype iterations resulting from integration errors. User-controlled optimizations boost performance by isolating the logic simulator from software-intensive operations such as block memory transfers and algorithmic routines.

About Mentor Graphics Corp.

Mentor Graphics Corp. (Nasdaq:MENT) is a world leader in electronic hardware and software design solutions, providing products and consulting services for the world's most successful electronics and semiconductor companies. Established in 1981, the company reported revenues over the last 12 months of nearly $600 million and employs approximately 2,750 people worldwide. Corporate headquarters are located at 8005 S.W. Boeckman Road, Wilsonville, Oregon 97070-7777; Silicon Valley headquarters are located at 1001 Ridder Park Drive, San Jose, California 95131-2314. World Wide Web site: www.mentor.com.

Mentor Graphics, Seamless and ModelSim are registered trademarks of Mentor Graphics Corporation. Co-verification Environment and Seamless CVE are trademarks of Mentor Graphics. All other company or product names are the registered trademarks or trademarks of their respective owners.

     Mentor Graphics
     Wendy Slocum, 503/685-1145
     wendy_slocum@mentor.com
     or
     Benjamin Group/BSMG Worldwide
     Jeremiah Glodoveza, 415/352-2628 ext. 559
     jeremiah@benjamingroup.com