Altium Cements Position as Price/Performance Leader

SYDNEY, Australia - December 3, 2001 - Altium Limited (ASX: ALU), a leading developer of Windows-based electronic design and development software, is pleased to announce that it is offering a 20% discount on all Protel full suite licenses and upgrades, and on P-CAD suite licenses and upgrades, purchased during the month of December 2001. With this aggressive move, Altium cements its position as the price/performance leader in the industry.

Historically, the most advanced, state-of-the-art design tools have been prohibitively priced, with access being limited to those engineers based within the few companies that could afford them, says Nick Martin, Joint CEO and Founder, Altium. At Altium, we were the first EDA vendor to challenge these barriers to innovation and technological advancement, and we continue to demonstrate to our customers and competitors that a large EDA budget is not a prerequisite for access to powerful design tools.

The current economic climate has seen software investment slow. Now more than ever, designers are looking for more design performance for their money. Many EDA vendors are now trying to stay competitive by offering discounted products in an attempt to match our prices, says Martin. However when it comes to high performance design tools at an affordable price Altium has always led the way, which is why we can now reinforce this position.

Another factor reinforcing Altium s leading price/performance position is that Altium s products are complete fully integrated professional design packages. Unlike competing products, Altium customers are assured that they have all the necessary tools included to design from concept to completion from schematic capture and SPICE simulation through to rules-driven board layout, shape-based autorouting, signal integrity simulation, and high-powered CAM tools. In addition, Altium is currently offering 12 months free Altium Total Support (ATS) membership with all new suite licenses for P-CAD 2001 and for new licenses and upgrades to the Protel 99 SE full suite.

As previously announced, Protel or P-CAD full suite customers who become ATS members before December 31 are also eligible to take advantage of our embedded software tools offer to receive TASKING s 8051 and XA toolsets absolutely free. The combination of these offers makes purchasing or upgrading to P-CAD or Protel full suites outstanding value.

With this offer, Altium continues to break down the barriers to innovation and technological advancement by ensuring that its customers are always equipped with the best technology in the industry at an affordable price.

Availability
Altium is offering a 20% discount on all P-CAD suite licenses and all Protel full suite licenses purchased during the month of December 2001. This represents a saving of up to US$1,600 on a Protel new license, and up to US$2,000 on a P-CAD new license. In addition, all new P-CAD 2001 and Protel 99 SE full suite licenses come with 12 months free membership to Altium Total Support (valued at US$1,995), which guarantees free access to any new versions released for your license during the membership period.

For more product information visit www.altium.com, or contact an Altium Sales and Support Center.

About Altium Limited
Altium Limited (ASX: ALU), trading as Protel International Limited (ASX: PRI) prior to August 6, 2001, is a leading global developer and supplier of desktop electronic design automation (EDA) and embedded software design tools for the Microsoft Windows environment.

Since the Company s foundation in 1985 and its release of the world s first Microsoft Windows based EDA tool in 1991, Altium has continued to apply the most advanced software design methods to provide powerful, easy-to-use and affordable design software to engineers and electronics designers worldwide.

Altium s current product brands include Protel, P-CAD, TASKING, Accolade, CircuitMaker and CAMtastic!. These products offer tailored solutions covering a range of hardware and software design processes.

Altium is headquartered in Sydney, Australia, and operates a number of sales and support offices in Australia, the United States, Japan and Europe as well as maintaining a large reseller network in all other major markets. More information about the Company and its products and services may be obtained from our new website at http://www.altium.com.

Altium Local Media Contact
Janice Hughes
Hughes Communications, Inc.
15 Oak Tree Lane
Lyme, CT 06371
USA
Telephone: +1 860 434 3782
Fax: +1 860 434 3781
Email: janice@hughescom.net

Corporate Media Contact
Jessica Maxwell
Altium Limited
Level 3, 12a Rodborough Road Frenchs Forest, NSW 2086
Australia
http://www.altium.com
Telephone: +61 2 9975 7710
Fax: +61 2 9975 7720
Email: jessica.maxwell@altium.com.au

Altium, Altium Total Support, Protel, P-CAD, TASKING, Accolade, CircuitMaker, and CAMtastic! and their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Altium Limited. All other registered or unregistered trademarks referenced herein are the property of their respective owners and no trademark rights to the same is claimed.