ATI today unveiled the latest facet of its strategy for the low-end PC and consumer appliance markets with the announcement of its integrated graphics and core logic product program, featuring Shared Memory Architecture (SMA). ATI's SMA products will join the company's low-cost graphics accelerators and System-On-a-Chip (SOC) products to provide PC manufacturers with the widest set of options to cost-effectively serve these market segments. ATI is the world's largest supplier of graphics technology.

ATI's SMA products integrate two key technology blocks, North Bridge and Graphics Acceleration, to address the trend toward low-cost PCs. By providing technology that previously required two discrete chips and following a shared memory approach, ATI will offer PC OEMs dramatic cost reductions for low-end systems. ATI's SMA products will interface with Pentium II and Pentium III microprocessors as well as other processors.

To address the current barriers to market acceptance of SMA products - substantial performance penalties and a reduced feature set - ATI is committed to providing SMA products that do not compromise features or performance as a result of integration. Using ATI's proven modular architecture approach, the company will add its best available graphics core and will continue to provide technology that off-loads the demands on the central processor, resulting in lower cost for PC OEM customers.

The SMA products are designed for the low-end emerging ultra low-end PC market. ATI is a leading supplier in all significant PC graphics categories, which include: the high-end, served by graphics boards, the mid-range, served by both boards and graphics chips, and the low-end, served by value graphics chips and SMA products. ATI expects to continue to increase market share by entering the ultra low-end where SMA products are expected to flourish, and the consumer electronics appliance market, where SOC products will dominate in the next two years. SMA products will be found in sub $500 and sub $800 systems, which will represent about 9 per cent of overall PC unit shipments this year, according to International Data Corporation of Framingham, MA.

Graphics Implementation By Market Segment

Market Segment Implementation

High end systems Graphics boards

Mid-range systems Graphics boards, graphics chips

Low-end systems Value graphics chips, SMA products

Ultra low-end systems SMA products

Consumer electronic appliances SOC products

ATI's unique business model of providing both graphics boards and components makes it well-positioned to thrive in the SMA market. With the advantages of strong graphics cores, a family of scalable products ranging from top to bottom, and software compatibility across all implementations, ATI will offer a full family of SMA products with different features and levels of performance. ATI will offer OEMs the easiest and most cost-effective path for low-end and ultra low-end systems. Sampling will begin the second half of 1999.

ATI's SMA program joins the company's SOC program, announced late last year, to round out a comprehensive graphics and multimedia lineup that offers customers the widest choice of products at unparalleled levels of performance. ATI's SMA and SOC programs are the result of its long history of integrating core technology blocks and responding to key market inflection points dating back to the company's initial integration of multiple graphics standards in 1985.

In November, 1998 ATI acquired Chromatic Research, Inc. to develop next-generation SOC technology to produce a highly integrated product that encompasses graphics, system logic and processor blocks into a single chip. This next-generation technology will be ideal for numerous multimedia applications incorporated in sub-$500 computers and consumer electronic devices such as set-top boxes.

Corporate Profile
ATI Technologies Inc., the world's largest supplier of 3D graphics and multimedia technology, designs, manufactures and markets innovative and award-winning multimedia solutions and graphics components for the personal computer, set-top box and consumer electronics appliance markets. An ISO 9002 company, ATI is the world's leading supplier of video and 2D/3D graphics accelerators to OEM and retail customers. Founded in l985, ATI employs more than 1,600 people at headquarters in Thornhill, Ontario, and in offices in the United States, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Barbados, Malaysia, Japan and Hong Kong. ATI is a public company whose shares trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange and NASDAQ.