ARCHIVE 2003

Invision (Mach II) invests in esmertec

London, UK – 13 November, 2003 -
esmertec, the leading provider of Java™ solutions for mobile multimedia phones and embedded devices, announces today the successful closing of its third round of financing of 23 million Euros. This represents the largest amount of private equity funding secured by a software company in Europe for over 15 months, and marks a significant upturn of investor confidence in technology companies.

Earlybird Venture Capital, Partners Group and Sofinnova Partners led the investment round, which was oversubscribed. The lead investors are now joined by BV Group Private Equity Berne, Quilvest Group, Rothschild Gestion, Invision AG, and Credit Lyonnais Private Equity Paris.

“This is a key milestone for esmertec, said CEO Alain Blancquart. “ In times when equity investments in technology companies are done with a lot of consideration and judgment, such vote of confidence further validates our strategy to deliver a high performance Java platform tailored to mass market devices such as mobile phones, PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) and home entertainment systems. We will use the resources to further develop esmertec globally”.

esmertec’s progress in 2003 contributed to investors’ further participation in the company expansion strategy:

- From over 25 customer projects worldwide, 28 millions units of esmertec mobile Java runtime platforms are expected to be shipped by March 2004. Current customer orders represent a backlog of over 120 million units.

- Technical relationships with leading industry players including Sun Microsystems, Intel, TI, Qualcomm, Agere Systems, NTT DoCoMo and other mobile operators were developed to deliver best in class Java solutions for each platform.

- esmertec established offices in Singapore, Taipei, Shanghai and Seoul to provide local customer support; while the acquisition of the Java Virtual Machine asset of Insignia strengthened esmertec’s portfolio of key technologies, R&D team and product delivery capacity.

- esmertec reached sustainable profitability in September 2003.

With this investment, esmertec is set to play a key role in the transformation of mass market mobile phones into multi-services multimedia terminals. The company plans to use the funding to further expand its global reach and fund new product development initiatives.

About esmertec
esmertec is the leading independent software company focusing on Java solutions and technologies for mass-market devices such as mobile multimedia phones, PDAs and home entertainment systems.
esmertec provides Java Virtual Machines and J2ME enabling software solutions delivering high performance computing on small devices to mobile equipment and consumer appliance manufacturers, embedded systems solutions providers, mobile service operators and application developers.
Founded in 1999, esmertec is a global company headquartered in Zurich, with engineering, sales and customer support operations located in Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States, Singapore, China, Korea and representation in Japan.

Big thinking in small spaces.
Media Contacts
esmertec Media Contact
Leng Stricker
Tel: +41 1 823 8918
lstricker@esmertec.com