ANVAR approves ARTERIS 4.2 M euros innovation program

PARIS, France — 2 February 2005 — Arteris SA, a start-up developing innovative products for network on chip (NoC) Intellectual Property, today announced that Anvar has approved an innovation program proposed by Arteris and agreed to fund it with a total of 4.2 M euros. The amount of ANVAR support for the proposed program is 1. 5 M Euros in funding. Anvar is the French Agency for Innovation. Arteris will use the interest-free loan to expand its research and development efforts as well as build its product roadmap to support its products market introduction.

The funding follows an initial round of investment totaling 10 million Euros from well-known technology venture capital firms last year and other sources. The company currently has 30 employees in its Paris headquarters.

Anvar's mission is to promote and finance innovation in French industry. Anvar offers a multi-faceted professional approach to small and medium sized companies, including providing access to consultancy services and expertise; establishing contacts with technical partners (laboratories, technology transfer agencies); and assisting in setting up industrial and commercial partnerships.

"This is a strong vote of confidence for the potential of our technology and our company in general. We are pleased to have the support of this prestigious agency and proud of our ability to qualify for funding from them," said Alain Fanet, founder, president and CEO of Arteris. "This interest-free loan will enable us to accelerate our development efforts and build a strong team to support the technology we are bringing to market."

Arteris introduced its innovative approach to solving complex System on Chip (SoC) problems in the Spring of 2004, unveiling plans to develop new solutions to improve the performance and system-level integration of this class of device. The company's NoC leap-frogs current design techniques that rely on bus-based technologies, and allows designers to build a true network on chip to connect the variety of subcomponents and IP blocks on an SoC.

About Arteris
Arteris, SA, provides Network on Chip solutions to transport and manage the on-chip communications within complex System-on-Chip (SoC) integrated circuits, increasing performance while enabling the most complex IP-laden designs. It allows chip developers to implement efficient and high-performance Network-on-Chip (NoC) designs, overcoming limitations of traditional interconnect approaches such as layered or pipelined bus-based architectures. Arteris' technology is scaleable in terms of the number of IP blocks designers can network, as well as with silicon manufacturing process evolution. The NoC solutions are compatible with existing design flows and with IP interface standards. The Paris-based company was founded by semiconductor industry veterans and is backed by an international set of venture capitalists. Arteris has raised more than $12 million in early funding from an international set of venture capitalists, including Crescendo Ventures, Techno Venture Management and Ventech. More information can be found at www.arteris.net.

About Anvar
Anvar's mission is to promote and finance innovation in French industry particularly for SMEs, and to facilitate the emergence of new products and processes in all fields of activity. Anvar operates under the aegis of the Ministries of Industry, SMEs and Research. From 1981 to 2003, a budget of 5.38 billion euros enabled Anvar to share the risk of innovation with more than 37,860 companies and laboratories, supporting more than 84,650 technological innovation projects.

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