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Intersil’s PRISM® II WLAN Chip Set Captures Prestigious Technology Award

PRISM Technology Acclaimed by Wireless Design & Development Magazine

IRVINE, CA., February 14, 2001 — Intersil Corporation (NASDAQ: ISIL), the world’s leading provider of silicon technology for Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs), announced today that its PRISM II WLAN chip set was honored as a Technology Award winner by Wireless Design & Development magazine, a leading wireless industry publication.

Wireless Design & Development announced its Top 20 Technology Awards for 2000 this morning at a breakfast reception in San Jose, CA., site of the Wireless Portable Symposium and Exhibition. Kim Stokes, editor-in-chief, wrote in the January 2000 issue of Wireless Design & Development, "these products are chosen by our staff and Editorial Advisory Board for innovation and unique contributions to the wireless industry."

PRISM II is the most highly integrated WLAN chip set on the market. It delivers an 11 megabit-per-second (Mbps) data rate and is fully compliant with the IEEE 802.11b standard. PRISM II-based systems are feature-rich and provide fast, reliable performance in all types of networking environments. Advanced design and process technologies reduce power consumption, design complexity and total system cost. The PRISM II chip set includes reference designs, evaluation kits, firmware and software in addition to the highly integrated silicon. The PRISM II reference design is Wi-Fi™ certified by the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (WECA), thus ensuring multi-vendor interoperability.

"Intersil began shipments of its award-winning PRISM II chip sets and development tools in October 1999 and we recently surpassed the three-millionth PRISM II shipment mark," said Larry Ciaccia, vice president and general manager of PRISM Wireless Products at Intersil. "More than 50 of the world’s leading wireless networking manufacturers have designed the PRISM II chip set into over 100 products for the home and office. It is very satisfying to the PRISM team to be recognized for its innovative contributions to the wireless industry."

Intersil’s newest chip set solution, PRISM 2.5, includes four integrated circuits, software and firmware. It has the world’s first single-chip integrated Baseband Processor/Medium Access Controller and is optimized for smaller form factors and embedded WLAN applications such as mini-PCI cards and single-sided PCMCIA cards for designing 802.11b-compliant wireless networking modules into small, handheld computing devices such as laptop PCs, Personal Digital Assistants and Web tablets.

Adoption of PRISM WLAN Technology
Since introducing the PRISM WLAN chip set in 1996, over fifty companies have incorporated PRISM chips in more than 100 product designs. In a May 2000 report, Cahners In-Stat Group called Intersil "the dominant force in the WLAN chip set marketplace with their PRISM chipsets holding the majority of market share." PRISM technology is designed to comply with the IEEE’s 802.11b global standard, and Intersil is a founding sponsor of the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (WECA), whose Wi-Fi™ brand is a mark of compatibility for 802.11b-based systems. PRISM/work™ and PRISM/home™ products are used in WLAN systems from industry-leading companies including Alcatel, Cisco, Compaq, 3Com, Dell, D-Link, Linksys, Nokia, Nortel, Samsung, Scientific-Atlanta, Siemens, SOHOware, Sony, SpectraLink, Symbol and Zoom.

About Intersil
Intersil is a leading supplier of semiconductors, reference designs and software for wireless access and communications analog markets. Intersil applies analog, mixed-signal and radio frequency (RF) expertise to products that enable wireless access to broadband media; provide reliable power management for PCs, file servers and portable information appliances; and convert analog and digital signals in cellular and Internet infrastructure. For more information about Intersil, visit the company's Internet homepage at www.intersil.com.

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PRISM is a registered trademark of Intersil Americas Inc.
PRISM/work and PRISM/home are trademarks of Intersil Americas Inc.
Wi-Fi is a trademark of the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance.
All other trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners.