Global Unichip reports 9.28B NTD 2008 revenue; Delivers 9th consecutive year of top line growth; More than 66%NRE revenue from 90nm and below projects

Hsinchu, Taiwan -- Feb. 12, 2009 -- The world’s leading Design Foundry service provider, Global Unichip Corp. (GUC; TW: 3443), held the 2008 year end Investor Conference at Taipei hosted by Dr. F.C. Tseng, chairman, and Jim Lai, president and COO today to share their views on GUC and the industry. The total revenues of 2008 were 9.28B NTD, an increase of 33% from 2007 (6.99B NTD). Total revenue from 65nm and 90nm reached 21%. Further breakdown of the revenue showed that 66% of NRE revenue came from 65nm and 90nm, and 11% of Turnkey revenue was from 90nm. The North American and Japanese markets brought in 85% of revenue.

The total revenue of 2008 was 9.28B NTD, operating income was 737M NTD, net income was 747M NTD, EPS 6.05 NTD (EPS 7.43 w/o employee profit sharing expense).

GUC has been focusing on service in advanced technology. Total revenue from 65nm and 90nm projects grew rapidly in year 2008, the YoY growth rate reached over 300%. For NRE revenue, 90nm projects represented 28% of the total and 65nm projects grew sharply to 38%. 32nm testchips are under development and expected to tape-out before the end of the year. The main customer base remains North America and Japan, with 73% and 12% of revenue respectively. China, Taiwan, Europe and Korea represent 6%, 5%, 2% and 2% of the revenue respectively.

Facing the global financial storm, many companies are reducing their work forces in order to focus their resources on brand management, system architecture and software. This is an opportunity for Design Foundry companies such as GUC. Currently, chip applications from end customers are primarily focused on communication products, which rose to 57%, while consumer products occupied 37%. GUC hitched the upsurge of Netbook, announced SSD develop platform (GP5000TM Platform) and expected to enter mass production second half of the year.

GUC strives to provide our customers with optimized solutions. GUC announced the fabless ASIC industry’s first full service SiP (System in Package) production flow in April 2008 and has now shipped almost eleven million units. This service helped customer to reduce upfront development time and cost.

Despite the current economic recession, GUC continues to maintain the growth momentum. After ranking 9th among the top 10 IC design companies in Taiwan in 2007, GUC ascended to 6th place this year. In addition to this recognition, GUC won the Taiwan 2007 & 2008 Technology Fast 50 Award and the Technology Fast 500 Asia Pacific 2008 by Deloitte. The potential of growth remains strong.

* Top 10 IC Design Companies in Taiwan

Rank	2008 Revenue(MTWD)		2007 Revenue(MTWD)
1	MediaTek	8978.9	MediaTek	7969.4
2	NovaTek	2617.6	NovaTek	3611.7
3	Himax	2500(est.)	Himax	2986
4	Phison	1885.6	Phison	2025.8
5	RealTek	1674.4	RealTek	1570.9
6	GUC	928.2	ViaTech	1467.4
7	ViaTech	792.6	Etron	1321.9
8	Etron	756	Sunplus	921.4
9	RichTek	684.2	GUC	698.9
10	Sitronix	640.2	ESMT	685.1

Data Source: M.O.P.S; Industrial Economics & Knowledge Center (2009/01)
About Global Unichip Corp.

Global Unichip Corp. (GUC), a dedicated fabless ASIC provider based in Taiwan, was founded in 1998. GUC is now publicly traded on the Taiwan Stock Exchange under the symbol 3443 with 2008 revenue of 295MUSD. GUC provides total solutions from silicon-proven IPs to complex time-to-market SoC turnkey services. GUC is committed to providing the most advanced and best price-performance silicon solutions through close partnership with TSMC, GUC’s major shareholder, and other key packaging and testing power houses. With state of the art EDA tools, advanced methodologies, and experienced technical team, GUC ensures the highest quality and lowest risks to achieve first silicon success. GUC has established a global customer base throughout Greater China, Japan, Korea, North America, and Europe. Its track-record in complex SoC designs has brought benefits to customers in time to revenue at the lowest risk. For more information, please visit http://www.globalunichip.com