Altera FPGAs Driving Latest Video Standards in Broadcast Distribution Equipment

National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Conference, Las Vegas, April 26, 2006— Altera Corporation (NASDAQ: ALTR) announced today at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) two new intellectual property (IP) cores for video applications that are compliant with the newest Pro-MPEG and HD.264 standards for video distribution. Delivered on Altera’s FPGAs, the cores enable rapid incorporation of these new design approaches into video distribution, monitoring and security products.

Pro-MPEG Forward Error Correction

A Pro-MPEG code of practice #3 forward error correction (FEC) module is now available for use with Altera’s Video over IP reference design. Optimized for Altera^® Cyclone^TM II and Stratix^® II FPGAs, the module adds error correction for recovery of missing packets, deduplication and packet reordering, and eliminates network-induced errors and their resulting video artifacts. Altera successfully tested the interoperability of this new reference design module with the T-VIPS TVG420 ASI to IP Video Gateway.

“The Video over IP market is expanding rapidly, requiring solutions that offer both cost and time-to-market benefits, with excellent quality of service,” said Janne T. Morstøl, chief operating officer from T-VIPS. “Having leveraged Altera’s FPGAs to ensure that our video gateway products were first to market, we can attest to the fact that Altera’s programmable logic technology is a competitive edge for manufacturers looking to win in this market place.”

H.264 HD Video Encoder

The H.264 HD Video Encoder is a high-definition (HD) hardware encoder jointly developed with ATEME of Bievres, France, that delivers unprecedented video quality. It is compliant with the H.264 HD video compression main profile standard and implemented on Stratix II FPGAs. This results in a three-inch square board allowing a dramatic increase in the encoding system’s HD channel density.

“Following our successful cooperation in delivering an FPGA-based SD video encoder to multiple customers, we have partnered with Altera to develop and demonstrate a real-time broadcast-quality H.264/AVC HD video encoder,” said Dominique Edelin, chief technology officer with ATEME. “Altera Stratix II FPGAs provide the high DSP performance required for HD video encoding.”

To accelerate system development time, Altera teams with key broadcast industry technology experts to provide designers with choices using either Altera solutions or its partners’ ready-to-use FPGA-based products.

“These broadcast solutions are examples of our commitment to providing our customers with a competitive edge,” said Todd Scott, senior director for Altera’s broadcast and consumer business unit. “Programmable logic-based solutions from Altera and its partners enable equipment manufacturers to rapidly go to market and deliver high-quality broadcast products to their customers. Additionally, the nonvolatile design security feature in our Stratix II FPGA protects partner’s IP and allows them to address a broad market via component- and board-based products.”

For more information on the range of Altera’s broadcast industry solutions, go to www.altera.com/b/broadcast.html.

Latest Broadcast Solutions at NAB2006

Altera will display its newest FPGA-based solutions that accelerate broadcast system designs at NAB2006 at the Las Vegas Convention Center, April 24-27, in booth C8112. These designs include:

• The new Altera Video and Image Processing Suite

• ATEME—H.264 HD broadcast quality encoder

• Commsonic—Scalable and optimized DVB-S2 and J.83 modulators

• Arcos—Scalable, multistandard video distribution

• Audio Video Development Kit, Stratix II GX Edition

About Altera

Altera Corporation (NASDAQ: ALTR) is the world’s pioneer in system-on-a-programmable-chip (SOPC) solutions. Combining programmable logic technology with software tools, intellectual property and technical services, Altera provides high-value programmable solutions to approximately 14,000 customers worldwide. More information is available at www.altera.com.