IKOS Systems and CoWare Announce Strategic Partnership to Link System-level Design and Design Verification

PARIS----April 3, 2000

First Integration Between CoWare N2C And IKOS' Accelerated

Simulation Yields Improved Verification Performance

Earlier In The Design Cycle

IKOS Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq:IKOS), a leading provider of design verification solutions and CoWare, Inc. (Santa Clara, Calif.), the leading provider of system-level design tools for complex system-on-a-chip (SoC) development, today announced that they have entered into a strategic alliance to link the two companies' technologies.

The first product from this alliance is a software interface between the CoWare N2C design tool and IKOS' Voyager VHDL accelerated simulation offering.

Ramon Nunez, president and CEO for IKOS Systems noted, ``We are excited to enter into this strategic alliance with CoWare because the synergy between our two companies' products enables customers involved in SoC development to have access to high-performance design verification much earlier in the design cycle. This access is imperative for achieving a highly integrated design environment that will result in silicon products that will hit critical market windows without incurring costly chip respins. We look forward to working with CoWare in the future on other areas of integration.''

``Time-to-market is the number one concern for systems companies developing new products for highly competitive markets,'' Guido Arnout, president and CEO of CoWare explained, ``As more companies adopt system-level design to speed new products to market, it's important that those system-level design solutions be integrated with design verification solutions to significantly cut overall design time. As CoWare N2C has been adopted by a number of the world's leading systems companies and IKOS is a leading provider of design verification solutions, this alliance is truly a win-win for both companies as well as our mutual customer base.''

The IKOS Voyager VHDL software interface to the CoWare N2C design is available immediately on the Solaris platform, at no additional charge. Availability on other platforms will follow in the next major release of CoWare N2C.

ABOUT COWARE

CoWare, Inc., founded in 1996, provides tools and methodologies that help engineering teams cut their system-on-a-chip design times in half. CoWare N2C provides an efficient means to capture, analyze and implement a system specification, with parallel development by hardware and software teams. In addition, CoWare N2C greatly enhances IP re-use and selection, further reducing design time. The CoWare N2C software is employed by major system and semiconductor companies including Alcatel, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Matsushita, Mitsubishi, Motorola, NEC, Nokia, Sony and ST Microelectronics. For more information, visit www.CoWare.com.

ABOUT IKOS

IKOS Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq:IKOS) is a technology leader in high-performance design verification solutions including hardware and software simulation for language-based design, logic emulation for system integration and compatibility verification, and verification services. The company's mission is to help customers realize their high-complexity electronic systems through innovative design verification solutions. IKOS has a direct sales operation in North America, UK, France, Germany, Japan, and India, and a distribution network throughout Asia-Pacific and Israel. The corporate headquarters are at 19050 Pruneridge Ave., Cupertino, Calif., 95014, 408/255-4567. For more information, visit http://www.ikos.com.

IKOS and Voyager are trademarks of IKOS Systems. All other brand or product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies and should be treated as such.

Contact:
     IKOS
     Larry Melling, 408/366-8522
     larry@ikos.com
     Kella Knack/Public Relations, 650/508-0371
     Kjcomk@cs.com
     Michelle Ochoa/Investor Relations, 415/439-4529
     or
     CoWare
     Mindy Powers, 408/845-7613
     mindy@CoWare.com
     Paula Jones/Public Relations, 650/967-3711
     paula@newiic.com