Santa Clara, CA – January 18, 1999 – ELSA Inc., a leading manufacturer of graphics accelerator boards, today announced the ELSA EDGEvantage SI Strategic Partner Program for System Integrators. The program will be officially launched on February 1st, 1999 at the System Builder Summit, a roundtable forum designed to develop and expand partnerships between the top system builders in North America and leading technology vendors.

"The major difference between consumer graphics cards lies not in the cards, but rather the pre- and post-sales support provided by the manufacturers themselves," said Douglas Yokoyama, Director of Sales," We believe that we understand what is necessary to do business in this competitive arena. The EDGEvantage SI Program is the result."

The minimum criterion to become an EDGE SI partner is 500 boards per month. In return, partners benefit from a 40-day product evaluation program, toll-free sales and technical support. An exclusive merchandising program enables system integrators to receive "EDGE currency" for promoting ELSA in marketing activities that are cashed in for graphics accelerator cards and customized marketing programs. An early adopter program enables system integrators to configure test systems before an ELSA product is officially launched to gain initial insight into product performance and features. In addition, system integrators may qualify for a hot link from the ELSA web site and trade show presence in the ELSA booth. 

"Today's system integrators face an incredibly competitive environment with a lot of players. They seek partners they can rely on to consistently provide the intangibles - timely product and dependable sales and technical support – allowing them to concentrate on increasing their own bottom line," said Chris Lorenz, director of hardware marketing at Ingram Micro. "ELSA's EDGEvantage Program meets this challenge."

All ELSA graphics accelerators include a six-year manufacturer's warranty, toll-free technical support, the ELSA Software Advantage software bundle, and free driver upgrades from the ELSA website (http//www.elsa.com). ELSA confirms that all hardware and software products from, or developed in the name of, ELSA, therefore drivers, firmware, utilities and tools, developed on or after June 15, 1998, will, as far as can be humanly judged, execute an error-free change over to the year 2000 including the recognition of the year 2000 as a leap year. 

ELSA Information

ELSA Inc. is a subsidiary of ELSA AG, a stock company based in Aachen, Germany. Founded in 1980, ELSA has built a world-class reputation in high-performance 2D and 3D graphics solutions in addition to a wide ranging ISDN and videoconferencing product family.

The ELSA logo is a trademark of ELSA AG. All names mentioned may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.