Artisan to Support Magma Blast Create, Blast Plan and Blast Fusion for 0.13-micron and Smaller Process Technologies

SANTA CLARA, Calif. & SUNNYVALE, Calif.--March 31, 2004--Artisan Components, Inc., (Nasdaq:ARTI), a leading provider of physical intellectual property (IP), and Magma® Design Automation, Inc. (Nasdaq:LAVA), a provider of chip design solutions, today announced the availability of Artisan library support of 0.13-micron, 90-nanometer and smaller processes for Magma's Blast Create™, Blast Plan™ and Blast Fusion(R) products. Artisan's IP product portfolio of standard cell, memory, I/O, analog and mixed-signal products including the Metro Platform has been verified as "Magma-Ready IP," and the Magma library support kit is available directly from Artisan's product download website for the standard cell products. With Artisan's direct library support, Magma users can benefit from immediate access to Artisan library revisions. Previously, qualified library support was offered through Magma's customer support team.

Building on the companies' existing relationship, Magma and Artisan intend to develop and deliver solutions that address growing nanometer-scale design challenges. Through close collaboration, Magma and Artisan plan to integrate leading library and IC implementation technology to provide mutual customers with a solid methodology for addressing timing, power, signal integrity and design for test.

"Magma has established itself as a significant electronic design automation player," said Neal Carney, vice president of marketing at Artisan. "The team at Artisan is eager to expand our already successful relationship to directly support the Magma tools and to collaborate in the creation of design solutions that tackle nanometer design challenges."

"Artisan is the recognized leader in the physical IP market," said Michael Ma, vice president of business development at Magma. "Magma has been working closely with Artisan for years and we're very pleased with the results. As we progress to the next level of collaboration, we will be delivering effective nanometer solutions to our mutual customers."

About Artisan Components
Artisan Components, Inc. is a leading provider of physical intellectual property (IP) components for the design and manufacture of complex system-on-a-chip integrated circuits. Artisan's products include embedded memory, standard cell, input/output, analog and mixed-signal components, which are designed to achieve the best combination of performance, density, power and yield for a given manufacturing process. Artisan has licensed its IP components to over 1,200 companies involved in integrated circuit design. Artisan is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. More information about Artisan Components, including free library access, can be found at www.artisan.com.

About Magma
Magma provides leading software for designing highly complex integrated circuits while maximizing Quality of Results with respect to area, timing and power, and at the same time reducing overall design cycles and costs. Magma provides a complete RTL-to-GDSII design flow that includes prototyping, synthesis, place & route, and signal and power integrity chip design capabilities in a single executable, offering "The Fastest Path from RTL to Silicon"™. Magma's software also includes products for advanced physical synthesis and architecture development tools for programmable logic devices (PLDs); capacitance extraction; and characterization and modeling. The company's stock trades on Nasdaq under the ticker symbol LAVA. Visit Magma Design Automation on the Web at www.magma-da.com.

Artisan Components and Artisan are registered trademarks of Artisan Components, Inc. Magma and Blast Fusion are registered trademarks and Blast Create, Blast Plan and "The Fastest Path from RTL to Silicon" are trademarks of Magma Design Automation Inc. All other product and company names are trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective companies.

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS:
Except for the historical information contained herein, the matters set forth in this press release, including statements regarding future support by Artisan of Magma products, future collaboration between Artisan and Magma, access to Artisan library revisions by Magma users, future nanometer design solutions to be delivered by Artisan and Magma and statements regarding the features and benefits of Artisan's and Magma's products are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially including, but not limited to Artisan's continued willingness and ability to support Magma products, Magma and Artisan's willingness and ability to continue to work together on nanometer design solutions, the ability of Magma's products to produce the desired results and the availability of competing products or solutions and Artisan's and Magma's abilities to keep pace with rapidly changing technology. Further discussion of these and other potential risk factors may be found in the parties latest filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission on form 10-K and form 10-Q. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. The parties disclaim any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.

Contacts

Magma Design Automation
Monica Marmie, 408-565-7689
monical@magma-da.com
or
Artisan Components
Claudia Natalia, 408-548-3172
claudia@artisan.com