ALAMEDA, Calif. – October 5, 2005 – Wind River Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:WIND), the global leader in Device Software Optimization (DSO), today announced its leading Linux device software platform for consumer devices, delivering the industry’s best commercial-grade quality Linux product line that scales to support a full range of device requirements from the smallest handhelds to the most robust network equipment. With Wind River’s commercial-grade Linux, device manufacturers have the flexibility to develop innovative, highly differentiated product offerings with complete assurance from the only commercial-grade quality platform that offers a “pristine-source”, fully tested and validated Linux 2.6 implementation, a cutting-edge Eclipse-based development suite and world renowned global support and professional services all from one trusted technology expert with over 20 years of experience.
“A dramatic shift is occurring as device manufacturers are gaining a competitive edge by relying on commercially available solutions for standardized tools and operating systems and focusing in-house development efforts on unique product innovation and differentiation,” said Chris Lanfear, director of the embedded systems software practice at VDC. “While this trend is driving explosive growth of device software, for Linux customers, it is exposing a plethora of new challenges such as unsupported, forked distributions that are nearly impossible and extremely costly to maintain long-term. Because Wind River can offer device manufacturers a complete solution to help retain Linux technology investments and support continuous open-source innovation, the company is well positioned to gain the market leadership position.”
Wind River Commercial-Grade Linux
With the addition of its new platform for consumer devices, Wind River Linux sets an unprecedented industry standard that defines commercial-grade quality and will enable manufacturers to more efficiently, effectively and successfully develop, deploy and manage a full range of Linux-based devices.
“Wind River’s commercial-grade Linux combined with the strengths of the Freescale i.MX31 multimedia applications processors provide a comprehensive approach designed to address the true needs and challenges facing today’s device manufacturers,” said Berardino Baratta, general manager, Mobile Applications Division, Freescale. “The combination of these two industry leading technologies is expected to provide the market with an exceptional, application-ready infrastructure optimized to support a wide variety of consumer devices.”
The industry’s fastest growing and most trusted commercial Linux device software provider, Wind River makes commercial-grade quality a reality for customers with comprehensive solutions that include industry leading development and runtime products, world-class Linux professional services and global product support delivered via local technology experts. Designed to support customer needs well beyond initial product acquisition, Wind River is the only Linux provider that combines:
* Commercial-Grade Products
o Pristine-Source Distribution: Based on a proven and stable 2.6.10 kernel, Wind River’s “pristine-source” Linux provides organizations with full visibility into their distribution enabling simple deployment of patches and updates when they become available from the open source community.
o Predictability: Wind River delivers semi-annual platform releases and updates that allow customers to align their product plans with predictable roadmaps and release dates.
o World-Class Development Suite: Wind River’s Linux platform is integrated and optimized with Wind RiverÒ Workbench, an end-to-end development suite. The Workbench development suite offers customers complete development lifecycle solutions from board bring-up to application development to testing. Based on Eclipse, the Workbench development suite can be easily extended to include open source and in-house plug-in tools.
o Full Testing and Validation: Wind River applies a proven device software development methodology across its Linux platform. With Wind River, customers have assurance that their Linux solutions are rigorously tested and verified on specific hardware with vendor expertise gained over years of developing and deploying complex, protocol-rich, device software platforms.
o Scalability: Wind River Linux platforms offer customers a full range of industry specific solutions that scale to support the requirements of every type of networking, consumer, automotive and general purpose device application. Wind River Linux includes integrated networking and security packages as well as patches based on specifications from open source groups such as CELF, CGL and SAF.
o Extensibility: For device manufacturers that require packages or patches such as real-time that are not included in the main source tree, Wind River Linux provides the required extensibility to easily integrate with any available ISV applications or middleware that are not yet accepted or supported by the open source community.
* Commercial-Grade Customer Enablement Services
o Wind River Professional Services: A key part of the company’s comprehensive Linux solutions, Wind River’s Linux Services Practice offers a full team of engineers with extensive experience delivering design, integration and optimization services tailored to the needs of the open-source community. Customers can leverage Wind River’s team of experts as a resource to quickly and effectively extend the capabilities of their engineering organizations.
o Wind River Educational Services: Wind River assists customers with building in-house Linux expertise by offering customer education and training courses. Wind River’s Linux platform includes service credits that can be used to train engineers, ensuring product development begins effectively and stays on schedule.
o Wind River Support: Wind River Linux platforms provide full access to the company’s worldwide support organization. Included in Wind River’s subscription fee, customers can leverage a variety of support channels to get the help they need when they need it.
* Commercial-Grade Assurance
o Extensive Industry Experience: Wind River’s extensive experience is unmatched in the device industry. The company’s device software products have been used by thousands of customers and deployed in millions of devices worldwide.
o Company Viability: With over 23 years in the device optimization business, customers can rely on Wind River’s stability and reliability as a viable corporate partner to ensure successful device development of projects today and in ten years.
o Customer-Centric Business Model: Wind River complements the technical advantages of its Linux platforms with a flexible, royalty-free business model. The company’s Linux platforms are offered on a per-developer, per-year subscription basis that is applicable across the enterprise regardless of project, processor or site. The yearly subscription includes Wind River worldwide support and all product updates including the semi-annual releases.
“Device manufacturers are discovering that just because a Linux device software product is commercially available, it does not guarantee the commercial-grade quality they really need to deliver emerging combinations of advanced device applications and services,” said John Bruggeman, chief marketing officer, Wind River. “We have found that device manufacturers do not want the costly challenges associated with building next-generation devices on a commercially available Linux solution that ‘looks and feels’ proprietary once it has been deployed. Customers are choosing Wind River for the security of a long-term technology partnership and our commitment to making commercial-grade quality Linux they can depend on.”
Availability
The Wind River Platform for Consumer Devices-Linux Edition is available now in Early Access for select customers. It will be generally available in November 2005.
About Wind River
Wind River is the global leader in device software optimization (DSO). Wind River enables
companies to develop and run device software faster, better, at a lower cost and more reliably. Wind River Platforms are pre-integrated, fully standardized enterprise-wide development solutions. They reduce effort, cost and risk, and optimize quality and reliability at all phases of the device software development process from concept to deployed product.
Founded in 1981, Wind River is headquartered in Alameda, California, with operations worldwide. To learn more, visit Wind River at www.windriver.com or call Wind River
at 1-800-872-4977.
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Forward-Looking Safe Harbor Statement
Certain statements in this press release including, but not limited to, the anticipated release and benefits of new products, services and reference designs by Wind River and resulting from collaboration with partners, are forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, delays in the development or integration of technologies, rapid technological or business changes that adversely affect customer demand or partner strategies, and other risks detailed from time to time in the Wind River reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission including its Form 10-K for the year ended January 31, 2005. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. Wind River disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.
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