ATI Delivers First 3D Gaming Chip For Cellphones

(Auszug aus der Pressemitteilung)

MARKHAM, Ontario /MUNICH, Germany – January 7, 2004 – Playing truly 3D enabled games on cellphones is now possible thanks to the new IMAGEON 2300 multimedia and graphics family of co-processors from ATI Technologies Inc. (TSX: ATY, NASDAQ: ATYT). Introduced today, these new co-processors enable game developers to go beyond simplistic game design approaches and give users complete freedom of movement, and visually rich 3D gaming experiences.

With IMAGEON 2300, ATI has taken its years of 3D gaming expertise – whether it is for the PC, notebook or console – and applied its world leading technology to the cell phone marketplace. The “tour-de-force” was to integrate a full fledged, no compromise hardware 3D engine in a cost effective and power efficient multimedia companion chip for the new generations of feature phones.

“ATI is revolutionizing the market once more by raising the bar and delivering yet another appealing feature to mobile phones and handheld devices: Hardware accelerated 3D gaming,” said Azzedine Boubguira, Director of Marketing, Handheld Products Group, ATI Technologies Inc. “As an industry-first, IMAGEON 2300 enables exceptional 3D gaming that will fully leverage and help monetize the higher bandwidth offered by 2.5G and 3G networks.”

“Consumers will be able to enjoy a real mobile console experience on their cell phone with the new ATI chipset,” said Adam Comiskey, General Manager EMEA, THQ Wireless (NASDAQ: THQI). “We were impressed with the capabilities of the IMAGEON 2300. The hardware 3D engine allowed us to use the original 2003 PC MotoGPII code, combining a high level of performance and graphics that has not been seen with a software only version. With mobile gaming moving at such a rapid pace, and THQ Wireless at the frontier of groundbreaking products, we are delighted to be working with ATI on this project.”

ATI continues its groundbreaking success in the wireless marketplace by delivering industry leading functionality designed to enhance OEM (original equipment manufacturer) products. IMAGEON 2300 includes the following:

• Advanced 2D and 3D graphics;
• MPEG 4 decode with real-time video playback at 30-fps and low power consumption;
• Video Capture Ports with support for high resolution camera sensors (1.3M and 2M pixels);
• JPEG CODEC to compress and decompress images to be either saved in memory and printed or shared wirelessly by the camera phone user; and,
• Many other features such as two display engines (primary and sub-display) and embedded frame buffer.

ATI has always been a strong believer, promoter and adopter of industry standards. IMAGEON is no exception, and offers support for the OpenGL ES rendering API – a royalty free 3D API consisting of well-defined subset profiles of OpenGL, with custom ATI extensions to further improve rendering performance. The goal is to help content developers easily create advanced 3D games and applications on a wide variety of wireless platforms.

“Enabling developers to tap into the incredible performance and realism of the new ATI IMAGEON 2300, Mascot Capsule has optimized its latest generation Micro3D V4 engine for the IMAGEON processor,” said Carl Korobkin, President and COO of Mascot Capsule America, a division of HI Corporation. “Providing IMAGEON developers with fully-compliant, world-leading implementations of JSR184 and OpenGL ES, the latest release of our Micro3D graphics engine, builds upon a platform currently incorporated in more than 30 million handsets and powers an impressive catalog of console-quality games.”

Availability
ATI’s IMAGEON 2300 media co-processor is currently sampling. Mass production shipments will start in Q1 2004.
ATI Technologies will exhibit its handheld products at International CES 2004, booth 23045, South Hall, Upper Level, Las Vegas Convention Center.

IDC data indicates that wireless gaming is on the rise and will generate USD $1 billion in wireless gaming revenue by 2006 for wireless carriers in the United States.

ATI