ROUSSET, France and VELIZY, France, February 11 /PRNewswire/ --

Atmel(R) Corporation (Nasdaq: ATML), announced today that the recent Payment Card Industry (PCI) and EMV approvals of Thales' Artema S10 PIN Pad is the result of a long-term collaboration between the two companies. Thales' Artema S10 PIN pad, which combines high performance with high security, is powered by Atmel's AT91SO101, belonging to the AT91SO family of secure microcontrollers for highly secure systems such as card payment terminals.

The AT91SO101's embedded security mechanisms, designed to reach Common Criteria EAL4+ certification, were instrumental in obtaining Artema S10's PCI certification. In addition, approval was achieved with the AT91SO101's integrated smartcard interface which is already EMV pre-certified.

Olivier Moraillon, Product Manager at Thales e-Transactions stated, "These certifications are the result of a fruitful combination of Thales' innovative drive to provide high-end secure card payment solutions and Atmel's proven expertise in designing integrated, quick-processing high security products."

Olivier Debelleix, Atmel's Security Worldwide Tactical Marketing Manager commented, "Our AT91SO product for secure systems serves the needs of our customers for security and versatile communication interfaces. We are proud of Artema S10's EMV and PCI certifications. This shows that Atmel's expertise in integrated security is a plus when it comes to serving customers like Thales."

Atmel's AT91SO Family

Based on the ARM(R) 32-bit SecureCore(TM) SC100 CPU core, the AT91SO achieves an outstanding level of integration of a wide array of peripherals. They feature 256KB of EEPROM, 100KB of RAM and 32KB of ROM, cryptography engines to accelerate DES/TDES, AES, SHA-n, RSA, Elliptic Curves as well as many flexible interfaces such as USB, SPI, UARTs, GPIOs, magnetic strip and smart card interfaces.

About Atmel

Atmel is a worldwide leader in the design and manufacture of microcontrollers, advanced logic, mixed-signal, nonvolatile memory and radio frequency (RF) components. Leveraging one of the industry's broadest intellectual property (IP) technology portfolios, Atmel is able to provide the electronics industry with complete system solutions focused on consumer, industrial, security, communications, computing and automotive markets.

About Thales

Thales is a leading international electronics and systems group, addressing defence, aerospace and security markets worldwide. Thales's leading-edge technology is supported by 22,000 R&D engineers who offer a capability unmatched in Europe to develop and deploy field-proven mission-critical information systems. To this end, the group's civil and military businesses develop in parallel and share a common base of technologies to serve a single objective: the security of people, property and nations. The group builds its growth on its unique multi-domestic strategy based on trusted partnerships with national customers and market players, while leveraging its global expertise to support local technology and industrial development. Thales employs 68,000 people in 50 countries with forecast 2007 revenues in excess of 12 billion Euros.

Thales delivers user-friendly solutions that simplify and secure electronic card transactions. The company is a European leader in the field of secure electronic payment solutions, supplying fixed, portable and mobile payment terminals, as well as integrated EFT solutions, unattended payment devices and secured PIN pads for ATMs.

(C) 2008 Atmel Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Atmel(R), logo and combinations thereof, are registered trademarks or trademarks of Atmel Corporation or its subsidiaries. ARM(R) is a registered trademark of ARM Ltd. Other terms and product names may be trademarks of others.

Information:

Information on Atmel's AT91SO family may be retrieved at: http://www.atmel.com/products/SecureTerm/

Atmel Press Contacts: Leslie Grace Casiano, Marketing Communications Manager Tel: +33-4-42-53-60-52, Email: leslie-grace.casiano@atmel.com Helen Perlegos, Public Relations Tel: +1-408 487-2963, Email: hperlegos@atmel.com Thales Press Contacts Beatrix Fontius, Thales e-Transactions Tel: +49-6103-91-16-205, Email: beatrix.fontius@thales-e-transactions.de

Web site: http://www.atmel.com

Leslie Grace Casiano, Marketing Communications Manager, +33-4-42-53-60-52, leslie-grace.casiano@atmel.com, or Helen Perlegos, Public Relations, +1-408-487-2963, hperlegos@atmel.com, both of Atmel Corporation; or Beatrix Fontius of Thales e-Transactions, +49-6103-91-16-205, beatrix.fontius@thales-e-transactions.de