Liquavista Secures EUR 12 Million Financing; Amadeus and GIMV join New Venture Partners in revolutionary display spin off from Philips

Business Wire, Dec 6, 2006

EINDHOVEN, Netherlands -- Amadeus Capital Partners, the European technology investor, and GIMV, the leading Benelux-based private equity and venture firm, have led a [euro]12 million Series A financing in Liquavista BV, a fabless display manufacturing company based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. New Venture Partners, who led the spin out of Liquavista from Philips Research in April this year, is also participating.

Liquavista has developed and patented an innovative electro-wetting technology for mobile device display screens. This technology has the same range and ability to show videos and full colour images as current LCD screens, while also addressing two main problems inherent in today's displays: poor readability in bright lighting conditions and high power consumption that drains batteries quickly. The opportunity for a new display technology that addresses these problems is huge, with today's global market for mobile displays at [euro]16 billion and for LCD displays at over [euro]62 billion.

Liquavista's electro-wetting displays (EWDs) are reflective rather than transmissive and so offer the potential for clear viewing in all lighting conditions, from a dimly lit office environment to the bright light of a sunny day, while consuming a tenth of the power of similar sized LCD screens. The company's first product platform - ColorMatch - offers world-beating brightness, with a reflective performance of more than 50% over an unlimited viewing angle. Products for which Liquavista's EWD technology offers real improvements in visibility and power consumption range from watches, mobile phones and digital cameras to ATM screens and large flat panels.

Mark Gostick, Liquavista's CEO said "Liquavista made a significant impact on the display industry when we launched this year. With the addition of two more Tier 1 investors to our shareholder base, we have the funding to increase our speed to market by getting our production partners up and running and allowing us to make our first customer deliveries."

Commenting on the investment, Amadeus Director, Hermann Hauser, who joins the Liquavista board, says: "The next big thing in display technology has to address poor visibility and power consumption. Liquavista's EWD technology solves these problems while maintaining video rate performance and could become a major force in this market."

Elderd Land, of GIMV's ICT team, who also joins the Liquavista board, says: "Liquavista is differentiated as an opportunity not only for its strong product focus and market insight but also for its ability to leverage the existing manufacturing infrastructure in novel ways which enables them to produce EWD displays as cost effectively as LCD."

Rob Rosenberg, Liquavista board member and Partner at New Venture Partners commented, "We are delighted to welcome Amadeus and GIMV as partners who can truly help accelerate Liquavista aggressively towards market."

Jukka Luoma, Technology Manager of Technology Platforms, Nokia concluded, "Displays are a critical component of mobile devices, as services develop that demand more from the screen technology. Radical new technologies such as reflective video displays are needed to spur this development and we are actively seeking out such new opportunities."

NOTES FOR EDITORS

About Liquavista BV www.liquavista.com

Liquavista was founded in 2006 by a team which originates from the world famous Philip Research Labs in Eindhoven. The company is now backed by Philips, New Venture Partners, GIMV and Amadeus Capital. CEO, Mark Gostick leads the organisation.

Based on technology invented by Rob Hayes & Johan Feenstra, in 2002, Liquavista uses advances in materials and technology to create Electrowetting displays that offer significant advantages over existing and emerging display technologies. Producing bright, colourful images, which show video content at very low power, Liquavista's products offer excellent indoor and outdoor viewability and are ideally suited for a wide variety of portable and mobile applications such as MP3 players, watches, cameras, phones, DVD players and automotive applications. Liquavista's early applications, which enable bright vibrant colours in simple displays, are expected to enter the market in 2007.

About Amadeus www.amadeuscapital.com

Amadeus is one of Europe's leading technology investors. Since its inception in 1997, the firm has backed nearly 60 companies covering computer hardware and software, mobile and fixed communications technologies and medical technologies. Investments include Cambridge Silicon Radio, producing single chip bluetooth radios for short range connections and floated on the London Stock Exchange in 2004, Optos, a manufacturer of laser retinal scanners which this year had a successful IPO on the London Stock Exchange, Cambridge Broadband, developing technologies for wireless broadband networks in countries with poor infrastructure and Valista, an electronic payments company.

About GIMV www.gimv.com

Since its incorporation in 1980 GIMV has grown into Belgium's most important private equity and venture capital provider and company-builder. GIMV has now become a major European and international market player. Both in Belgium and abroad, GIMV invests in information and communication technology, life sciences as well as in growth financing and management buy-outs (MBOs) of companies in more traditional sectors. GIMV has been listed on Euronext Brussels since 1997. GIMV's ICT team recent investments include Dialog Imaging Systems (GER), Xanadu Wireless (NL), Clear2Pay (BE), CoreOptics (GER), VirtenSys (UK) and Liquavista (NL).