Pulsic Secures €5.3M First Round Investment

Bristol,UK – 15 January 2003 – Pulsic Limited, the physical design tools provider for complex IC designs, today announced it has closed €5.3 ($5.5) million in first round investment financing from venture capital firms Prime Technology Ventures and Index Ventures. Pulsic was officially launched in January 2002, and develops, markets and sells the Lyric™ product range; a flexible, high performance shape-based IC routing environment for complex analog, custom digital, mixed signal and system-on-chip (SoC) design.

“To have investors such as Prime and Index on board validates our commitment and proven value to the IC design market. It also reinforces our vision that the ever increasing problems related to wiring are ideally addressed by the power and flexibility of a shape-based methodology, and that this has to be the optimum way forward to achieving physical design closure”, said Mark Williams, Pulsic’s President and CEO. “This investment is particularly significant in the current economic climate with funding procurement being more difficult than ever”, he added.

Lyric was launched in June 2002, but it has been the success of Pulsic’s early adoption program that has allowed the company to run on revenue since its foundation in January 2000, selling licenses to customers including Fujitsu, Mitsubishi, NEC and Panasonic. Lyric has already yielded well over 100 tape-outs.

“Pulsic’s unique and proven technical capabilities, coupled with a focused and energetic management team, make Pulsic an attractive investment,” said Sake Bosch, Managing Partner for Prime Technology Ventures. “Their impressive early customer traction and momentum prove their market acceptance. It’s very exciting to find a European company like Pulsic that is positioned to be the leader in this particularly complex and vital segment of the EDA market”, added Neil Rimer, General Partner for Index Ventures.

Pulsic plans to use the funds to accelerate its business and marketing operations, as well as grow its research and development activities to broaden the scope of its current products and fuel the developments of its future leading-edge technologies.

As a result of the investment Pulsic also completed its acquisition of Chip & Chip, a Silicon Valley based EDA start-up specializing in IC layout tools.

About Prime Technology Ventures
Prime Technology Ventures (PTV) is a leading European venture capital fund investing in fundamental hardware and software technologies in wireless, networking and the Internet. PTV focuses particularly on technology centres in the Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, Israel, and in the United Kingdom. The PTV team works closely with portfolio companies that strive for rapid international growth and maturity. PTV brings along a special combination of successful real-world business experience and a broad network of business accelerators, special investors, and partnering expertise. This combination also makes PTV an attractive lead investor in syndication with local funds. To learn more about Prime Technology Ventures visit www.ptv.com.

About Index Ventures

Index Ventures is a leading pan-European venture capital fund dedicated to investments in high technology and life sciences. Index began investing in European technology in 1992 and has backed more than 40 companies over the past several years. The Index Ventures team has a deep technology focus and the ability to leverage a network of cross-Atlantic strategic relationships. In line with that proactive approach, Index seeks out the top entrepreneurial teams in each investment area and then brings to bear all of its core assets in helping the entrepreneurs build their company. Index Ventures investors include leading technology firms and institutional investors. To learn more about Index Ventures visit www.indexventures.com.