Imagination Announces Quarter of a Billion POWERVR Devices Shipped

POWERVR now the clear standard for mobile and embedded game graphics acceleration

San Francisco, 9th March 2010: Imagination Technologies, the leading multimedia chip technologies company, reports that POWERVR, its hardware graphics acceleration technology, has become the standard for mobile and embedded gaming. POWERVR now has an installed base of over 250 million devices across the mobile phone, media player and embedded markets.

There are over 25,000 games running on POWERVR platforms and, as an opportunity, the market size is now significantly larger than the current generation handheld console market.

POWERVR Insider, the ecosystem for developers of POWERVR enabled hardware and software products, now has over 16,000 members and a thriving online community.

Says Tony King-Smith, VP marketing, Imagination: "POWERVR is the leading 3D graphics technology in cellphones and game-enabled media players. Moreover it is the technology enabling gaming in new market areas such as set top boxes, tablets and netbooks. With over a quarter of a billion units shipped the opportunity for developers is significant. If only a minority of those with POWERVR enabled phones choose to play games and entertainment applications it still represents a market opportunity on a par with the best of handheld or fixed consoles."

The latest game content from POWERVR Insider partners, including Digital Legends and Fishlabs, and new POWERVR enabled devices including OMAP 4 from Texas Instruments, will be on display on Imagination's booth, #705, at GDC and GDC Mobile 2010 (Moscone Center, San Francisco, 9th – 13th March). Developers can book time with Imagination engineers at the booth for a personalised tour of the POWERVR Insider SDK and toolchain.

Says Dr. Jon Peddie, president, Jon Peddie Research: "Simply put: Imagination's POWERVR is the standard for mobile 3D graphics. The company has built an enviable lead, but more than that it has created an opportunity for both its customers, and the wider developer ecosystem to build a market that for applications alone will be worth more than $5 billion dollars in 2010."

At GDC 2010 in San Francisco the company will be launching a major update to the POWERVR Insider SDK, the most widely used (and completely free) mobile development SDK (software development kit).

This update includes support for Android platforms and a new PVRTrace utility for application analysis. In addition to 3DSMax and Maya, there is now support for Blender, the open source 3D modelling package.

For the first time the SDK DVD, available free at Imagination's booth at GDC, will also include Imagination's promotional demos showing the very best of mobile and embedded graphics capability. All content will also be available for download from www.powervrinsider.com

About Imagination Technologies

Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE:IMG) – a global leader in multimedia and communication silicon technologies – creates and licenses market-leading processor cores for graphics, video, multi-threaded embedded processing/DSP and multi-standard communications applications. These silicon intellectual property (IP) solutions for systems-on-chip (SoC) are complemented by a strong array of software tools and drivers as well as extensive developer and middleware ecosystems. Target markets includemobile phone, handheld multimedia, home consumer entertainment, mobile and low-power computing, and in-car electronics.Its licensees include many of the leading semiconductor and consumer electronics companies. Imagination has corporate headquarters in the United Kingdom, with sales and R&D offices worldwide. See: www.imgtec.com.