LEAD Technologies^®‘ feature-packed release supports powerful DjVu^® and MrSID^®formats for dramatically smaller file sizes, true portability, and enhanced viewing.

Seattle, Washington, USA – December 15, 2003 - LizardTech^®, Inc. – a leading developer of digital imaging software and viewing tools – today announced its DjVu and MrSID file formats are supported within new LEADTOOLS^® Version 14, empowering software developers to work far more efficiently than before.

“The addition of the DjVu and MrSID file formats is part of a significant document imaging focus being delivered by LEADTOOLS Version 14,” says Catherine Whitten, LEAD Technologies Marketing Manager. “LEAD is taking advantage of the exceptional distribution capabilities that meet the demands of the document imaging community and other key market sectors served by LEAD Technologies. We were very pleased to include both DjVu and MrSID formats within the new release.”

LizardTech’s MrSID format – the-de facto industry standard for geospatial imaging – empowers developers to work more collaboratively and cost effectively, thanks to its unique compression capabilities. Using MrSID, users can instantaneously view and manipulate images, locally and over networks, without sacrificing quality or wasting time. MrSID also enables seamless browsing, updating, and easier archiving. You can pan and zoom seamlessly; multi-resolution capabilities enable you to create clearer images with each mouse click.

LizardTech’s open-format DjVu technology transforms the process of working with digital images and scanned color image documents, and facilitates highly accurate optical character recognition (OCR) – even when using color image documents. DjVu image documents are the smallest in the industry, up to 1,000 times smaller than TIFF files, and anywhere from 5 to 100 times smaller than JPEGs or PDFs. Using DjVu, users can work more intuitively by eliminating repetitive tasks, freeing up hours of time for innovation and invention. Anyone can access DjVu and MrSID files; free plug-ins are available at www.lizardtech.com.

“LEAD Technologies shares our commitment to creating innovative software solutions that meet the needs of developers who want to reduce their time to market and realize a rapid ROI,” says Carlos Domingo, LizardTech president and CEO. “The LEADTOOLS v14 release brings significant improvements for document imaging and geospatial markets, and we are proud to have LizardTech be part of it.”

About LEAD Technologies

Since 1990, LEAD Technologies, Inc. has been a global leader in the imaging developer toolkit market, providing programmers with feature-rich tools to “image-enable” their software applications. LEAD Technologies pioneered the fastest software-only image compression and continues to lead the field in advancing new imaging technologies and offering those technologies to programmers world wide.

About LEADTOOLS

LEADTOOLS is a family of comprehensive toolkits designed to help programmers integrate raster, document, medical, multimedia, Internet and vector imaging into their applications quickly and easily. LEADTOOLS gives developers the most flexible and powerful imaging technology available offering imaging technology for scanning, color conversion, display/special effects, annotations, image processing, compression, image format import/export filters, database imaging, printing, Imaging Common Dialogs, OCR, OMR, ICR, screen capture and much more. The result of fourteen years of development, the toolkit literally puts millions of lines of code at the fingertips of application developers. Included with the toolkit is extensive sample source code for Visual Basic .NET, C/C++, Visual C++ (MFC), C++ Builder, Visual J++, Visual FoxPro, Access, Delphi, and VB and Java script, and support for Visual Studio 6.0 database connectivity (Oracle, SQL, OLE DB, ODBC, and JET).

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

Seattle, Washington, USA – December 1, 2003 – LizardTech’s newest software release will be a star participant at Autodesk University’s 11th Annual User’s Conference Tuesday-Friday, December 2-5, in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The conference will mark the official debut of GeoExpress 4.0 with MrSID, featuring powerful new tools for image re-sampling on the fly, easier mosaicing, even with tiles at different resolutions, improved visual cropping, and more.

Carlos Domingo, LizardTech president and CEO, said Autodesk University attendees will be the first to experience the software’s new interactive preview window, which virtually assures accurate encoding every time, as well as robust new cropping tools that allow users to combine cropping with encoding, saving hours of valuable time.

“Anyone who works with massive imagery data sets knows how frustrating it can be when work is slowed down by inefficient technologies,” Domingo explained. ”With GeoExpress 4.0, we’ve taken a giant leap forward and made it possible to create the highest-quality geo imagery, in far less time than before. An intuitive new graphical user interface puts all the tools you need, right at your fingertips. We can assure conference participants that they will be very pleased at the advances the geospatial industry is undergoing right now.”

Autodesk University conference organizers said the annual event will also offer ample networking and collaboration opportunities.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

October 28th, 2003 – Seattle, WA USA - LizardTech^®, Inc. – a leading developer of digital imaging software and viewing tools – has been named to the Technical Committee of Open GIS Consortium, Inc. (OGC), a company-government-university coalition engaged in developing common interfaces and protocols for the burgeoning geo-information processing industry.

“The OGC is committed to creating interoperability among complex and competing geo-information processing systems,” explained Mark Reichardt, Executive Director of OGC’s Outreach & Community Adoption Program. ”Right now, incompatible standards make file and service sharing between user communities extremely complex and time consuming.”

“We are delighted to have LizardTech as a member of OGC, and we’re confident they will play a substantial role in advancing interoperability standards within our Consortium consensus processes,” added Mark Reichardt.

LizardTech’s geospatial solutions leverage the widespread industry acceptance of MrSID^®technology, a revolutionary file format that reduces giant imagery up to 95 percent of its original size, while preserving image clarity. The result: Content is infinitely more accessible (and valuable) to users, regardless of their network speed, desktops, or field devices. MrSID’s unique ability to mosaick multiple geo images, its quick image conversion, and lossless encoding ratios also lead to significant time savings. MrSID is endorsed for accuracy by the US Geological Survey and the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, and is compatible with all major GIS software.

Explains LizardTech vice president Karen Morley, “Interoperability is the core principle at work behind all of our geo imaging software. Our users who depend on these tools for mission-critical work can be assured that their technology investment will include the implementation of OpenGIS^® specifications, which will serve them well in the future – because the developer played a role in creating interoperability standards.”

Morley adds, “LizardTech geo imaging software is installed on millions of desktops worldwide and we recognize that our customers come from vastly different backgrounds. By joining the OGC on the technical committee level, we’re able to contribute to and review ongoing specifications, laying the foundation for our next generation of raster imaging users.All of us at LizardTech are proud to be a member of OGC, and endorse its mission of promoting true interoperability standards. We have already partnered with some OGC members, and look forward to significant collaborative opportunities.”

About OGC

OGC is an international industry consortium of private companies, government agencies and universities participating in a consensus process to develop publicly available geoprocessing specifications. Open interfaces and protocols defined by OpenGIS^® Specifications support interoperable solutions that “geo-enable” the Web, wireless and location-based services, and mainstream IT, and empower technology developers to make complex spatial information and services accessible and useful with all kinds of applications. www.opengis.org

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

October 13th, 2003 – Seattle, WA USA - LizardTech^® Inc. – a leading developer of digital imaging software and viewing tools – today announced the appointment of Brian Soliday as vice president of geospatial sales for the Americas.

Soliday brings to LizardTech more than 18 years of leadership in the geospatial industry including vice president of sales and marketing at both Earth Search Sciences and RMSI. He was executive vice president of sales and marketing at Space Imaging, where he directed global business growth and customer service operations. Just prior, he was director of GIS sales development for Autodesk, and business development manager at both Trimble Navigation Ltd., and Genasys II, Inc. Soliday holds a B.S. degree in Geography and a Master of Arts Degree, Summa cum Laude, from the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

“With his key industry knowledge, Brian is an outstanding choice to guide our business development in North and South America,” said Carlos Domingo, LizardTech president and CEO.“This is an exciting time for LizardTech. We’re doing some innovative things, and we are very pleased to have Brian leading us to an even larger community of GIS users.”

LizardTech’s GIS solutions include GeoExpress with MrSID^®, the industry-acclaimed software that makes large imagery far more accessible – and valuable – to its users, while maintaining the highest level of quality and accuracy. MrSID (Multi-resolution Seamless Image Database) is also the de facto image standard with the greatest amount of direct industry support from major GIS software vendors such as ESRI, Intergraph, ERDAS, Autodesk, Maplnfo, Bentley and GE Smallworld among others. To complement GeoExpress with MrSID, Express Server from LizardTech is also available to help optimize the delivery of MrSID images as well as other open standards such as TIFF, JPEG and BMP over any network including the Internet.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

August 18th, 2003 – New York, NY & Seattle, WA - Announced on June 20, 2003, Celartem Technology USA has completed its acquisition of LizardTech, Inc., a leading developer of digital imaging software. “We can now focus on integrating LizardTech businesses within the Celartem family of companies,” said Osamu Ikeda, president and CEO of Celartem USA. “Our goal is to provide an increasing range of high value products to our expanding customer base of digital image and document users.Our companies offer innovative solutions to enhance the creation, management, control and distribution of digital content.”

Carlos Domingo, former COO of Celartem Technology Inc. will replace the out-going CEO, Scot Land as the new president and CEO of LizardTech, Inc. “I am honored that Celartem has chosen me to take LizardTech to the next level:this acquisition will bring the financial support and stability that LizardTech needs to strengthen its leadership in the market,” said Domingo.“Celartem and LizardTech understand the fundamental needs and technologies for digital image and document distribution better than anyone else. I am very excited about the future products that will come out of the synergies between the two companies.”

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

July 7th, 2003 – San Diego ( LizardTech, Booth#1943 ) – Expanding on the market acceptance of LizardTech’s lossless MrSID^® technology, LizardTech has announced today viewing support for MrSID Generation 3 (MG3) into ESRI’s ArcGIS product line. ESRI ArcGIS users now can take advantage of MrSID lossless and advanced lossy images in their ArcGIS applications for feature classification, military applications or other mission critical imaging uses.

Incorporated into the recently released GeoExpress with MrSID version 3.0, lossless MrSID technology preserves images with pixel-for-pixel fidelity in a greatly compressed format, easily reusable in future applications. Once in lossless format, MrSID imagery can be repurposed for fast and easy distribution at any compression ratio.

“We are pleased to extend our long-term relationship with LizardTech,” said Rich Turner, senior product manager – ArcGIS, ESRI. ”This integration ensures ESRI ArcGIS users now have access to view their existing MrSID imagery and also take advantage of the great improvements in LizardTech’s MrSID Generation 3 technology.”

“ESRI users from ArcView 3 to ArcGIS can now dramatically improve their imaging capabilities with our next-generation MrSID technology in GeoExpress,” said Karen Morley, Vice President of geospatial imaging at LizardTech. ’GeoExpress will not only allow users to encode into advanced lossless and lossy MrSID formats, but they can also use other recent workflow enhancements in ArcGIS such as the ability to mosaic individual MrSID tiles or create localized updates on existing MrSID mosaics. We look forward to working closely with ESRI to further extend the value their customers obtain from their high resolution raster imagery.”

ESRI Product Support

ESRI’s ArcGIS 8.3 platform supports the latest lossless format and all previous versions of MrSID and is immediately available via a downloadable file from the ESRI Website. ESRI ArcGIS releases will incorporate native viewing for both MrSID Generation 2 and Generation 3 image formats. The MrSID download for ArcView 3.x may be obtained at LizardTech’s Download section.

Lossless Encoding Increases Image Accuracy

Lossless MrSID is wavelet-based imaging technology that dramatically increases the value of geospatial data by making it more accessible and useful while maintaining the highest level of quality and accuracy.Lossless technology maintains numeric pixel fidelity between original and encoded imagery, enabling geospatial imagery to be used in new applications, on more devices and across more networks.In addition, it provides significant reductions in the cost of storing, sharing and using geospatial information.

Automatic Mosaicking Saves Image Creation Time

In addition to the lossless data capability, advanced mosaicking features included in GeoExpress allow users to easily create a single mosaic automatically from multiple sources. In an industry-first, organizations that update imagery, such as governments, data providers and civil engineering firms, will be able to update existing MrSID mosaics without re-encoding. They will also be able to mosaic existing tiled MrSID images into a seamless MrSID mosaic, automatically.Together, these benefits will save time and reduce storage needs.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

June 20th, 2003 – Seattle, WA – LizardTech, Inc., a developer of software and services that dramatically increase the value of complex digital content, and a standard bearer in the geospatial imaging arena, today announced that it had reached a definitive agreement of acquisition with Celartem Technology USA, Inc.

LizardTech, Inc. employs 29 people and is being acquired for $11.25 million in cash.Under terms of the agreement, LizardTech will operate as a separate unit within the Celartem Group of companies and will be known as “LizardTech Inc., a Celartem Company.”LizardTech will maintain its existing U.S. operations headquartered in Seattle and European efforts based in London. Over time, R&D and sales operations will be merged with existing Celartem efforts in Europe and Japan. Celartem Group officers and board of directors will oversee LizardTech operations, as well as for Extensis, the other existing Celartem Group subsidiary. Carlos Domingo, Celartem Global Office chief operating officer, directs acquisition strategy and will lead post-acquisition efforts. Interim LizardTech CEO Scot Land will remain in place until a new CEO is appointed by Celartem.

“Celartem and LizardTech share a passion for imaging and document technology,” said Case Kuehn, chief operating officer, LizardTech. ”The winning combination of product assets, operational resources and combined global reach will deepen our image and distribution offerings to provide immediate and long term benefits for our customers worldwide – especially within the geospatial arena.”

Celartem Technology USA, Inc. is wholly owned by Japan’s Celartem Technology, Inc. (Hercules:4330), which provides digital image and secure content distribution solutions. The addition of LizardTech’s core technology and applications furthers Celartem’s vision to consolidate and develop technology to simplify and enhance the creation, management, control and distribution of digital content. The acquisition puts Celartem in a strong position to change the existing definition of digital content to encompass both images and digital document content – to include fonts, images and a variety of related document elements.

“Celartem is aggressively working toward landmark product development for the overall imaging industry,” said Jiro Shindo, chairman, Celartem Technology, Inc.”Bringing LizardTech under the Celartem Group banner vaults us ahead in our efforts to offer a wider range of high-end imaging and distribution products for digital content owners, distributors and users.”

“Our core technology for imaging and distribution is a natural fit with LizardTech’s products,”added Osamu Ikeda, president, Celartem Technology USA. ”We are especially excited about what this will mean for a variety of industry markets moving forward.”

LizardTech offers several innovative imaging and geospatial technologies and there are no expected short-term changes to the existing product and technology brands being used by LizardTech.MrSID (Multi-resolution Seamless Image Database) is the defacto standard image format in the geospatial imaging field; the GeoExpress line of products based on MrSID offers additional geospatial capabilities. LizardTech’s DjVu is a powerful workflow enabler for the general document imaging market. Document Express with DjVu is the company’s document imaging solution widely used in the US, throughout Europe and also in Japan, by global enterprises that require distribution of business-critical content over any network, including narrowband and wireless. Combined and expanded product development efforts moving forward will address a broad range of needs for creative professionals, the defense industry, as well as the publishing and imaging markets.

“The synergy of Celartem and LizardTech technologies not only accelerates the momentum of LizardTech solutions, it further strengthens the customer care elements of our product offerings,”said Karen Morley, vice president of Geospatial Imaging, LizardTech, Inc. ”The combination of our technologies and LizardTech’s strong support for the defense market will allow us to offer more powerful imaging tools to this important community and will also help us grow our participation in geospatial industry activities such as Open GIS Consortium (OGC).”

“As another of the Celartem Group’s portfolio companies, Extensis is thrilled about what this means for combined future product developments,” said Kevin Hurst, vice president of marketing, Extensis.”With this related group of technologies, the overall imaging industry can expect to see some innovative products over time.”

Final acquisition arrangements will be completed in July 2003.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

May 21st, 2003 – Seattle, WA – LizardTech Software today released Express Server 4.5, designed to enable fast, high-quality Internet viewing of images and documents of any size. ExpressServer 4.5 includes support for streaming MrSID^® Generation 3 (MG3) lossless and lossy image types and provides additional geospatial viewing tools.

An ideal enhancement to existing Web servers, ExpressServer 4.5 allows organizations to efficiently serve high-quality MrSID images, DjVu documents and other popular image formats over a network to any client device. LizardTech’s GeoExpress with MrSID is a wavelet-based lossless and high-quality lossy imaging technology that dramatically increases the value of geospatial data by making it more accessible and useful while maintaining the highest level of quality and accuracy. Document Express with DjVu is LizardTech’s document solution that reduces the file size of digital documents up to 1000 times compared with the original TIFF files and as low as two percent of the size of corresponding PDF files.

Key enhancements with ExpressServer 4.5 include the ability to deliver streaming MrSID Generation 3 images over the Internet, dramatically improving end user experience and providing faster image recognition of massive image mosaics. In addition, the Express Server 4.5 plug-in viewer adds support for mapping functionality, including measuring, overview, metadata viewing, and smart caching.

“The ability to receive streaming MrSID images in this latest release allows users to immediately view general features of an image while higher resolution data is quickly loading,” said Karen Morley, Vice President, Geospatial Imaging.”Now faster than ever, you can locate an area or select an image and view what you need, when you need it.”

Additional LizardTech Express Server product details can be accessed at LizardTech’sExpressServer information page.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

April 23rd, 2003 – Seattle, WA – LizardTech Software and Leica Geosystems today have announced support for LizardTech’s lossless MrSID^® technology into Leica Geosystems’ ERDAS IMAGINE product line. The latest mapping software vendor to support LizardTech’s next-generation lossless technology, Leica Geosystems’ ERDAS IMAGINE users now will be able to quickly and efficiently view and store original-quality imagery for feature classification, military applications, or other mission-critical mapping uses.

Incorporated into the recently released GeoExpress with MrSID version 3.0, lossless MrSID preserves images with pixel-for-pixel fidelity in a greatly compressed format-easily reusable in future applications. Once in lossless format, MrSID imagery can be re-purposed for fast easy distribution at any compression ratio.

Said Karen Morley, director of product management, geospatial imaging, at LizardTech, “Many of our customers are using Leica Geosystems’ products for image analysis and exploitation. The new Lossless MrSID file format will allow them to achieve greater accuracy while performing functions such as classification.”

“We are excited to be able to extend the benefits of incorporating lossless MrSID technology to our customers who use ERDAS IMAGINE,” said Ian Anderson, Senior Product Manager, Leica Geosystems. “With this added functionality, our customers can save processing and viewing time while retaining critical image accuracy requirements.”

ERDAS IMAGINE products supporting both the latest lossless and previous versions of MrSID include versions 8.6 (released December 2003) and 8.5. IMAGINE MrSID lossless support is immediately available via a downloadable .dll file from the Leica Geosystems Web site. Future ERDAS IMAGINE releases will incorporate native viewing for both MrSID Generation 2 and Generation 3 image formats. The MrSID download is available here.

Lossless Encoding Increases Image Accuracy

Lossless MrSID is wavelet-based imaging technology that dramatically increases the value of geospatial data by making it more accessible and useful while maintaining the highest level of quality and accuracy.Lossless technology maintains numeric pixel fidelity between original and encoded imagery, enabling geospatial imagery to be used in new applications, on more devices and across more networks.In addition, it provides dramatic reductions in the cost of storing, sharing and using geospatial information.

Automatic Mosaicking Saves Image Creation Time

In addition to the lossless data capability, advanced mosaicking features included in GeoExpress allow users to easily create a single mosaic automatically from multiple sources.In an industry-first, organizations that update imagery, such as governments, data providers and civil engineering firms, will be able to update existing MrSID mosaics without re-encoding. They will also be able to mosaic existing tiled MrSID images into a seamless MrSID mosaic, automatically.Together, these benefits will save time and reduce storage needs.

About Leica Geosystems

Leica Geosystems is a surveying and geomatics technology group with a tradition of providing unique systems for accurate 3D data capturing, visualization and modeling of space-related data. Known for its software and hardware technological advances, Leica Geosystems has expanded its surveying and geomatics technology product areas to offer a line of GIS and mapping solutions. With its robust line of aerial cameras, workstations, and imaging and photogrammetry software from LH Systems and ERDAS, Leica Geosystems now offers a wide range of systems for mapping professionals including GIS, production photogrammetrists, engineers, and remote sensing analysts.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.

April 3th, 2003 – Seattle, WA – LizardTech Software today announced that Autodesk, the world’s leading design software company, has incorporated recently-released lossless MrSID(r) technology into Autodesk Inc.’s latest version of some its software products.As a result, millions of users of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and civil design software gain the ability to quickly and efficiently view and store original-quality imagery.Autodesk’s support for the lossless MrSID technology satisfies increasing market demand for image encoding processes that preserve all of the original fidelity.In addition, growing demand for using large imagery over remote networks creates need for the sophisticated compression algorithms contained in GeoExpress with MrSID.

Many Autodesk applications require numerically accurate pixels. Autodesk’s support of lossless MrSID is designed to address that growing market need for images and designs that are identical to the originals, in a format that makes them usable in their desktop and web applications.

Autodesk supports lossless MrSID in its Autodesk Map 2004, Autodesk Map Series 2004, Autodesk Civil Design 2004, Autodesk Land Desktop 2004, Autodesk Survey 2004, Autodesk Raster Design 2004 and Autodesk MapGuide 6.3 products.

Said Karen Morley, director of product management, geopatial imaging, at LizardTech, “Our customers have been asking for native support of lossless MrSID in their applications.This gives them access to numerically accurate images at the same speed and efficiency of previous MrSID versions.This agreement with Autodesk provides these benefits to millions of users of Autodesk products.”

Lossless Encoding Increases Image Accuracy Lossless MrSID is wavelet-based imaging technology that dramatically increases the value of geospatial data by making it more accessible and useful while maintaining the highest level of quality and accuracy. Lossless technology maintains numeric pixel fidelity between original and encoded imagery, enabling geospatial imagery to be used in new applications, on more devices and across more networks.In addition, it provides dramatic reductions in the cost of storing, sharing and using geospatial information.

Automatic Mosaicing Saves Image Creation Time In addition to the lossless data capability, advanced mosaicking features included in GeoExpress allow users to easily create a single mosaic automatically from multiple sources.In an industry-first, organizations that update imagery, such as governments, data providers and civil engineering firms, will be able to update existing MrSID mosaics without re-encoding. They will also be able to mosaic existing tiled MrSID images into a seamless MrSID mosaic, automatically. Together, these benefits will save time and reduce storage needs.

More information on GeoExpress with MrSID can be accessed at www.LizardTech.com. More information on Autodesk can be found at www.autodesk.com.

About LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London and Tokyo. For more information about LizardTech, visit www.lizardtech.com.

About Celartem

Celartem Technology Inc. http://www.celartem.com develops and sells innovative technologies for storage, access and distribution of rich media content. Celartem has developed technology in the areas of digital image compression, scalable image viewing and secure content distribution and management. Celartem is listed on the Osaka Securities Exchange, JASDAQ: 4330. Established in 1996, Celartem is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and has a wholly owned subsidiary, Celartem Inc. d.b.a. LizardTech with headquarters in Portland, OR.