PARIS, FRANCE — October 19, 2004 — Spansion LLC, the Flash memory subsidiary of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NYSE: AMD) and Fujitsu Limited (TSE: 6702), announced today that it has established European headquarters in Paris, France, to serve as its center for worldwide mobile security. A primary strategic focus for Spansion is to develop advanced security technologies to protect data on memory subsystems. France, renowned for its expertise as one of the world’s leading regions for security, is the ideal location for Spansion’s mobile security initiative.
The new office will be led by Managing Director Jean-Marc Julia who joins Spansion from Gemplus, the leader in the smart card industry. Mr. Julia will be responsible for driving the company’s European marketing, sales, and engineering efforts in addition to leading the development of technology and industry standards that help safeguard valuable data stored in all types of mobile devices.
“The European region is absolutely critical to our overall success,” Mr. Julia said. “Europe is Spansion’s second-largest and fastest-growing market. In fact, we are the Flash memory leaders in the automotive, wireless and embedded sectors. Strategically, France is home to numerous security standards bodies and significant engineering talent, which will be critical to our innovation in the mobile security arena.”
Before joining Spansion, Mr. Julia was the senior vice president in charge of the Reader Business Unit and R&D for the Financial and Security Services Business Unit at Gemplus. Prior to Gemplus, he held several management positions in quality, manufacturing and R&D with Hewlett-Packard Company.
Data Security
A key component of the company’s strategy is to work with partners and standards organizations to help focus the industry squarely on a critical business need: securing mobile data. “Today, professionals, students and families rely on powerful Flash-enabled mobile devices to store and manipulate large amounts of personal and business-critical data,” Mr. Julia said. “Securing this information from unauthorized access is an important priority for Spansion, our industry colleagues and local standards bodies. Ultimately, it’s good for the customer and it’s good for business.”
Spansion has a history of developing security innovations. For example, the company currently offers a variety of Flash memory products that incorporate Advanced Sector Protection (ASP) technology. ASP technology is a hardware solution built into Spansion’s Flash memory products that, when activated by customer provided software, creates a digital fortress around individual memory sectors. As a result, it helps safeguard against such threats as cloning, signal theft and unauthorized access to data. The highest level of security in the suite of options supported by ASP technology is the ability to selectively password-protect sectors of Flash memory with a 64-bit password. More than 1.1 million years are required to try all possible combinations.
Advanced Sector Protection also complements another security feature in Spansion devices – Secured Silicon Sector. This technology enables the storage of a permanent Electronic Serial Number that provides a means to uniquely identify a specific Flash memory device to help prevent it from being cloned in applications such as mobile phones.
“With the newly established headquarters in Paris,” said Mr. Julia, “Spansion is well positioned to accelerate its security innovations and play a significant role in securing data stored on Flash memory subsystems.”
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About Spansion
Spansion, the Flash memory subsidiary of AMD (NYSE:AMD) and Fujitsu Limited (TSE:6702), is the world’s leading manufacturer of NOR Flash memory. Spansion Flash memory is used by leaders in the wireless, cellular, automotive, networking, telecommunications and consumer electronics markets. Spansion offers the industry’s broadest Flash memory portfolio, including 5-, 3-, and 1.8-volt products from 1 to 512 Mbits in single-die and multi-chip product (MCP) configurations. Spansion engineering innovations, such as the award-winning MirrorBit™ technology and simultaneous read-write (SRW) architecture, continue to advance the state of the art.
To address global consumer desire for Flash-enabled products, Spansion operates four dedicated Flash fabs and four dedicated Flash assembly sites around the world. All Spansion production fabs are certified to the demanding ISO/TS16949 and ISO9001:2000 quality standards and the ISO14001 environmental standard. Information about Spansion Flash memory solutions is available at www.spansion.com/overview.
Voor meer informatie:
AMD
Anne Salin
Telefoon: +33 616 753 836
E-mail: anne.salin(at)amd.com
Whizpr
Winnie Silvertand
Telefoon: +31 (0)317 410 483
E-mail: amd(at)whizpr.nl