NATIONAL SEMICONDUCTOR'S NEW SYSTEM-ON-A-CHIP PRODUCTS BOOST COMPANY'S POSITION AS PREMIER TECHNOLOGY PROVIDER FOR INFORMATION APPLIANCES

New Wave of Products Increases National's Leadership In Growing IA Market

September 18, 2000 - Extending its position as the leading information appliance (IA) technology provider, National Semiconductor (NYSE: NSM) today introduced a family of new National® Geode™ silicon solutions optimized for three high-growth information appliance markets: personal Internet access devices, set-top boxes and thin clients.

"National is in a unique position to leverage our technology, our leadership in integrated x86 processing, and our strengths in wireless communications, power management, networking and analog to make breakthrough silicon products and reference designs for our information appliance customers," said Brian Halla, National's chairman, president and chief executive officer.

In addition to producing silicon solutions for information appliances, National has played a key role in developing the market. Overall, the information appliance market is expected to grow 60 percent per year over the next five years --- approaching one billion units by 2005. National has brought together industry-leading partners at all layers of the Internet economy value chain - manufacturing partners, hardware and software technology partners, integrated service providers (ISPs) and industry channel partners - to produce information appliances. National's unique single-chip approach and its extensive partner network provide unprecedented system-level integration with rich feature sets enhanced for personal access devices, set-top boxes and thin clients.

The single-chip processors that National introduced today are dedicated to the functionality of an information appliance through the optimum combination of performance, power consumption, price and size:

• Geode SC1200 processor for set-top boxes helps transform TVs into full-featured information appliances that give consumers interactive TV programming, Web-based electronic program guides, instant messaging and chat, Web-browsing and e-mail services.
• Geode SC2200 processor creates improved thin client desktop computing, allowing businesses to reduce cost, deploy applications more easily and quickly, and scale technology to meet today's growing information needs. Various sectors, such as government, education, hospitals, insurance and banking, airlines and hotels are turning to thin client networks because they are extremely reliable and can be operational from a centralized server.
• Geode SC3200 processor is designed to meet the needs of the mobile personal access device market, such as the National® Geode WebPAD™ device. These "instant-on" devices automatically connect to the Web when powered up, allowing users to be on the Internet in less than a minute. While they are extremely attractive to first-time Internet and email users, these devices also provide current PC users with a quicker, more reliable and convenient means of accessing the wealth of information and services available on the Internet at an affordable price.

In today's information age, the complexity always associated with a personal computer (PC) continues to be a roadblock for more people accessing the vast amount of information provided on the Internet. Information appliances are a viable alternative for both consumers and businesses that want faster, easier-to-use, smaller and more affordable devices to access the Internet.

"A new generation of information and entertainment appliances are empowering people by putting information right at their fingertips, any place, any time and on any device," said Ed Graczyk, director of marketing communications for the Microsoft TV Platform Group. "Microsoft supports National's innovative approach to enabling this market with the Geode processor running on the Microsoft TV software platform. As the worldwide leader in software for personal and business computing, Microsoft strives to produce market-leading products such as Microsoft TV that meet our customers' evolving needs."

National is working with almost all of the top PC companies on the production or development of information appliances targeted for consumer and business markets. Four of the top five consumer electronics makers are using National's reference designs for information appliances. Overall, National's reference designs based on its Geode™ technology have been designed in to more than 100 information appliances currently in production or development. With the new single-chip innovations, National is positioned to extend its lead in the information appliance market.

"National has clearly demonstrated a leadership position in the field of information appliances silicon solutions," said Rick Doherty, director of The Envisioneering Group. "They continue to expand upon an IA infrastructure of manufacturing, technology and channel partners, which was non-existent two years ago. These infrastructure relationships are critical for meeting the exploding demand for fast time to market IA systems."

About National Semiconductor
National Semiconductor provides system-on-a-chip solutions for the information age. Combining real-world analog and state-of the-art digital technology, the company's chips lead many sectors of the personal computer, communications, and consumer markets. With headquarters in Santa Clara, California, National reported sales of $2.1 billion for its last fiscal year and has about 10,500 employees worldwide. Additional company and product information is available on the World Wide Web at www.national.com.

For more details on information appliances, see IA.NATIONAL.COM.