February 19, 2002

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ATHENA GROUP UNVEILS FIRST OF TERAFIRE™ FAMILY OF ULTRA-HIGH PERFORMANCE DSP COPROCESSORS
World's Fastest Security Processor Gives Twice the Performance in Half the Area

GAINESVILLE, FLA - February 19, 2002 - The Athena Group, a leading provider of high-performance DSP (digital signal processing) technology, today announced the availability of the first of its TeraFire™ family of security accelerators. Designed specifically for computationally intensive SoC (system on a chip) applications, TeraFire accelerator engines execute over one trillion (1,000,000,000,000) 16-bit multiply-accumulates (MACs) per second in power-efficient IP cores-realizing next generation computing goals today. Athena makes their TeraFire DSP teracomputing technology available as reusable IP.

The first TeraFire coprocessor, the EXP-A1100, establishes new standards for accelerated performance in security processing applications. The EXP-A1100 performance scales from 5,000 to 100,000 RSA private key operations per second-breakthrough performance for Secure Socket Layer and Internet Key Exchange (SSL/IKE) computations.

"Athena's proprietary technology is ideal for extremely computationally intensive problems, delivering over twice the performance in less than half silicon and power of previous solutions," said Dr. Jon Mellott, Chief Technology Officer of Athena. "This Performance Density enables new classes of applications in both the ultra-high performance and ultra-low power domains. The TeraFire product line provides the opportunity to develop application specific solutions for customers with extreme performance requirements."

With TeraFire, Athena enables next generation security products with "must have" IP that is highly portable, adaptable, and easily incorporated. The availability of high-performance security processing as an IP core creates an industry-wide opportunity to incorporate network security in complex SoC applications. "Athena's technology is clearly superior," said Doug Whiting, Chief Scientist of Hifn, a dominator in the network security and flow classification market. "Their technology is fast, small, and scales to ultra-high performance levels making it ideal for our next generation, state-of-the-art products." Incredibly small and power efficient, the entire family of TeraFire DSP accelerator cores is designed specifically for demanding SoC applications. Additional TeraFire processors are now in development for the wireless and broadband communications markets. These new processors will join Athena's complete DSP IP library designed for power-sensitive applications requiring extraordinary performance.

Product Description
Each TeraFire core package is delivered as a firm core optimized to any customer-specified library. The package includes the core itself, verification suites, timing and simulation models, and user support documentation.

Athena's IP cores are designed for efficient implementation and rapid delivery. The company's proprietary, wholly automated implementation and verification methodology produces fully synthesizable, synchronous, testable IP cores of the highest quality. All Athena IP cores achieve a score of 95% or better on the OpenMore scale of IP reusability.

About The Athena Group, Inc.
The Athena Group, Inc. of Gainesville, Florida licenses high-performance DSP (digital signal processing) technology that delivers breakthrough performance, reduced area and reduced power consumption in a broad range of SoC products. Athena's proprietary technology powers leading edge applications such as secure e-commerce, wireless communications, and video compression. In addition to their high value application level solutions, Athena also produces a full line of fundamental DSP functions suitable for SoC integration.

Athena was founded in 1986 and is privately held. For more information contact:
The Athena Group, 5522 NW 43rd St., Suite B, Gainesville, FL, 32653.
Phone: 352-371-2567. Fax: 352-373-5182. Web: http://www.athena-group.com.

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For more information, contact:

Pat Rugg, VP Sales and Marketing
The Athena Group, Inc.
5522 NW 43rd St., Suite. B
Gainesville, FL 32653

Phone: (352) 371-2567 ext. 110
Toll-free: (800) 741-7440 ext. 110
Fax: (352) 373-5182
Email: prugg@athena-group.com
Internet: www.athena-group.com

TeraFire is a trademark of The Athena Group, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.