Thomson Multimedia and Seagate Form New Consumer Electronics Storage Systems Powerhouse

THOMSON multimedia (NYSE:TMS), a world leader in digital
consumer electronics (CE) products and Seagate Technology, Inc. (NYSE:SEG), the world’s largest
consumer electronics storage supplier, today announced an equally owned joint venture to form an
independent company, called CacheVision, that is focused on value-added storage-centric
systems for home consumer electronics. Leveraging the product development activities of
Seagate’s Consumer Solutions Group and THOMSON multimedia’s digital expertise, CacheVision will
begin operation immediately, bringing the new-media technology partners together to develop
cost-optimized, time-to-market integrated systems to be incorporated in the consumer electronics
products of the world’s largest manufacturers.

Based in San Jose, California, CacheVision will soon employ approximately 100 people focused on
the design, development, and customization of an array of CE systems, including integrated
modules that add function to CE devices, component subsystems for integration into CE devices
and potentially complete OEM consumer devices. These systems will bring together
technologies-such as disc drives, compression hardware and software, analog to digital
conversion, and interface connectivity-to enable CacheVision OEM customers to deliver tested,
reliable, optimal consumer solutions to the market much more quickly.

Tomorrow’s TV will soon make available for viewing thousands of programs, delivered through
hundreds of cable, satellite or terrestrial channels. A key to smart viewing of this huge volume of
entertainment content is the use of sophisticated tools, such as navigation systems, electronic
program guides, and preference engines, but it also requires local digital storage capacity, based
on hard disc drive technology, to help store and browse hours of content. In addition,
high-capacity storage devices are even more necessary because of the emergence of the
personal TV concept, where embedded software learns individual programming preferences, and
automatically manages storage and replay functions. Advanced consumer electronics storage
modules may soon be needed in many consumer electronics devices, including TVs, set-top boxes,
Personal Video Recorders and DVD players, to address storage needs.