Cheltenham, UK – January 10, 2006. ARTiSAN Software Tools, a global leader for UML 2 and SysML-based real-time systems and software modeling tools, has announced that AgustaWestland, a leading worldwide group excelling in the design and manufacture of advanced technology helicopters for both civil and military applications, with major operations in Italy, the UK and USA, has selected ARTiSAN Studio as its corporate standard UML tool for software and systems development. AgustaWestland companies worldwide will benefit from this corporate decision.
“We are very impressed with ARTiSAN Studio’s feature-set,” said Dr. Ferdinando Battini, who is responsible for software practice at AgustaWestland. “We looked thoroughly at tools from several vendors but were immediately struck by ARTiSAN Studio’s ease of use and Ada code reversing capabilities. We have had distinct problems in the past reversing code that was written without a model. The reverser in ARTiSAN Studio is the best we have evaluated. We are also extremely pleased with the Automatic Code Synchronizer, which enables us to keep our UML models and Ada source code synchronized all the time.”
AgustaWestland is part of Finmeccanica, one of the largest investors in R&D in Italy, the UK and the USA, spending over 12% of its revenues. Investing in research has enabled Finmeccanica to accumulate substantial technological know-how, especially in the aerospace and defence sectors. As a result of this and its highly focused strategy of international positioning and development, Finmeccanica plays key roles in every main program and project in the strategic aerospace and defense sector, contributing its own exclusive design, development and production competence.
Jeremy Goulding, President and CEO of ARTiSAN commented: “We are extremely pleased that ARTiSAN Studio was selected by AgustaWestland as the systems and software engineering modeling tool of choice. ARTiSAN Studio’s scalability and multi-user repository combined with its open architecture and extensibility enables project development teams to be easily integrated regardless of their size or location. AgustaWestland has successfully exploited the extensibility capabilities of ARTiSAN Studio to create its own add-in tools as well as to customize our code generators to meet specific project requirements and further enhance productivity. This flexibility is essential for organizations as process and project requirements inevitably change in response to business, technology and customer demands.”
Increasing internationalization is a key feature of the AgustaWestland’s business strategy. It succeeds in some of the world’s most difficult markets, defeating formidable competitors. The US Coast Guard uses AgustaWestland A109 Power helicopters and has chosen the AB139 for its Deepwater program. Phoenix Police Air Support Unit selected the new high performance single engine A119 Koala helicopter, just a few months after the delivery of their first multi-role twin engine A109 Power helicopter. The President of the United States will soon fly in the US-101 helicopter variant developed specifically for the American market in a joint venture with Lockheed Martin.
“We are very proud that AgustaWestland chose ARTiSAN Italy as a partner and ARTiSAN Studio as the UML system and software corporate tool of choice,” concluded Carmelo Tommasi, Managing Director of ARTiSAN Software Tools SRL. “Agusta in Italy and Westland in UK were the first Finmeccanica companies to adopt ARTiSAN Studio. We are also extremely pleased that this decision will soon be extended to the Finmeccanica corporate level and all the Finmeccanica companies worldwide will be using ARTiSAN Studio to design mission-critical systems and software. AgustaWestland and other Finmeccanica companies are an important part of the avionics and defense electronics backbone in Europe and this corporate agreement will confirm ARTiSAN’s leadership in this strategic industry sector.”
# # #
About AgustaWestland
AgustaWestland brings together the technical and commercial expertise of almost ten decades of the combined experience of Agusta SpA and Westland Helicopters Ltd, a track record that sees the company ready to exploit global business opportunities. AgustaWestland is a leader in a number of the world’s most important helicopter markets and offers the widest range of advanced technology products available for both civil and military applications. AgustaWestland has two subsidiaries in the USA: AgustaWestland North America located in Reston, VA and Agusta Aerospace Corporation located in Philadelphia, PA., where Agusta helicopters are assembled and customised for the US market. Value of production in 2004 stood at € 2,542 million. The cumulative order backlog at the end of December 2004 amounted to € 5,238 million, including the 2004 order intake of € 1,809 million. In 2004, AgustaWestland delivered 92 helicopters of which 66 were for commercial customers. The headcount at AgustaWestland was 8,968 at 31 December 2004, with major operations in Italy, UK and USA.
About ARTiSAN Software Tools
ARTiSAN Software Tools is the leading supplier of collaborative modeling tools for requirements analysis, specification, design and development of complex applications. The company provides standards-based, multi-user tool support from architectural frameworks through systems design to software implementation. ARTiSAN offers products, services and a process for systems and software modeling to accelerate the development of next-generation real-time systems while ensuring that they always meet requirements. ARTiSAN enables engineering teams to visualize, design and validate systems before building them, and simplifies implementation with code generation and software reuse. Winner of the 2005 SD Times 100 award in the Modeling category for bringing UML and SysML to real-time embedded systems, ARTiSAN offers the most advanced tools for complex applications development. Founded in March 1997, ARTiSAN is privately held with headquarters in Cheltenham, United Kingdom. The company has regional sales offices and distributors throughout the world. For more information, call +44 (0)1242 229300 internationally, or 1(888)511-7975 from the US; or visit www.artisansw.com.
Statements in this news release looking forward in time are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Investors are cautioned that forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties including market acceptance and demand for our new products, our dependencies on our silicon wafer suppliers, the impact of competitive products and pricing, technological and product development risks and other risk factors detailed in the Company’s Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Actual results may differ materially from forward-looking statements.
Please send reader enquiries to:
Emma Allen
ARTiSAN Software Tools
Suite 701, Eagle Tower, Montpellier Drive, Cheltenham, GL50 1TA, UK.
Tel: +44 (0) 1242 229300
Email: [email protected]
Ref: ART009US