Productivity Systems, Inc. Partners with M-Systems to Provide DiskOnChip Solution for Minno Development Kit

The Minno™ Development Kit and NAND based DiskOnChip allow designers to easily develop data centric, media rich, applications for various OS environments on the OMAP platform

CTIA (Booth #3971), NEW ORLEANS, Mar. 17, 2003 - Productivity Systems, Inc. (PSI), a leader in OMAP™ development platforms, creator of the Innovator™ Development Kit and Independent Texas Instrument OMAP Technology Center, has begun collaboration with M-Systems (Nasdaq:  FLSH), a leader in flash-based data storage products, on the newly introduced Minno™ Development Kit.  PSI's Minno™ Development Kit incorporates M-Systems' DiskOnChip® flash disk, software tools and TrueFFS® drivers.

The Minno™ Development platform allows software developers to easily port high-performance applications to Texas Instruments' widely adopted family of OMAP application processors while reducing valuable time-to-market.  Thus, enabling device manufactures to deliver smart devices ahead of the competition. 

Minno™, with DiskOnChip, supports developers creating applications for all popular operating systems, such as Linux and Microsoft Windows CE. 

M-Systems' DiskOnChip flash disk was selected for inclusion in the platform based on its easy of integration.  It provides a complete local storage solution for mobile designs that require features such as operating system (OS) boot capability, a unique ID, customized protected partitions, a full, non-volatile "hard drive" for the file system to access and a one-time programming (OTP) area for license storage.

 "PSI's Minno™ O5 reference design combined with M-Systems' DiskOnChip offers a NAND-based flash disk solution that can range from 16MB to 128MB with a lower cost structure versus NOR flash implementation," said Grant Kyle, PSI's CTO. "By also using DiskOnChip's boot functionality, we were able to reduce the bill of materials and save valuable board space."

"Leading smart device manufactures are all considering OMAP platforms for their design and Minno™ Development Kits and tools makes engineers' jobs less complicated," Said Jerry Ault, Executive Vice-President of Productivity Systems, Inc.  "Today's smart devices are confronted with a dilemma; on one hand low cost and the other advanced features and functionality, adding DiskOnChip to Minno™ will enable M-Systems to address the entire spectrum of devices from low end to high end."

"Targeting the thousands of developers creating software for OMAP, PSI once again shows its strength with its Minno™ Development Kit," said Dan Inbar, vice president for M-Systems' Mobile DiskOnChip.  "This slick platform, with DiskOnChip as the only non-volatile memory device, will be of great benefit to those developing software for mobile devices running Linux, Palm, Symbian and all Microsoft operating systems."

About PSI
The Minno™ 05 will be manufactured, sold and supported by Productivity Systems Inc. PSI is an Independent OMAP Technology Center and, in addition to offering the Minno™ Development Kit, they provide reference designs, developer tools, training and engineering support to device manufacturers and developers using the various processing platforms. Visit www.prodsys.com for more information.

About M-Systems
M-Systems (Nasdaq: FLSH) is a leader and innovator of flash-based data storage products known as flash disks.  M-Systems' flash disks provide the functionality of a mechanical hard drive in a silicon chip.  M-Systems' products are based on its patented TrueFFS® technology and target applications in a vast array of markets, including connected devices, mobile and telecom.  M-Systems' products include the DiskOnChip®, DiskOnKey® and Fast Flash Disk (FFD™) product families. For more information, please contact M-Systems at  www.m-sys.com.

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