TOKYO, Apr. 14, 2004 Tokyo Electron Limited (TEL) announced Wednesday that it has concluded a distribution agreement with Advanced Digital Information Corp. (ADIC; Head Office: Redmond, Washington, U.S.A.; Chairman & CEO: Peter H. van Oppen), under which TEL will serve as the master distributor for sales of ADIC's tape library and disk-to-tape products in Japan. With the conclusion of this agreement, TEL will expand ADIC's business in Japan to begin marketing, sales, and maintenance jointly with ADIC, which enjoys the top global share of the open tape library market.

ADIC, which celebrated its 20th anniversary last year, was quick to anticipate the spread of open systems and has launched open tape library products to the market ahead of other companies. Since 2001, ADIC has maintained the top global share of this market. Because of the market's trust in ADIC products, the company enjoys a sound financial situation, as exemplified by annual sales of approximately 45 billion yen, no long term debt, and consistent investment of around 10% of sales in R&D.

According to IDC Japan, an IT research firm, Japan's tape library market(*1), which is valued at around 80 billion yen(*2), is expected to see a steady increase in the demand for backup systems via networks, such as storage area networks (SANs). TEL, handling a large number of mission-critical products for SAN construction, has been making efforts for many years to create a storage market in Japan. Focusing on increasing demand, TEL intends to strengthen its ties with ADIC, which is known for its global achievements and reliability, and increase its share of the market in Japan.

"ADIC is very pleased to be joining with TEL to bring more effective data protection solutions to the open systems IT community in Japan," said Scott Roza, ADIC Vice Present of Sales and Marketing. "TEL has demonstrated through its long history that it has a superior understanding of advanced technology and a firm commitment to serving the storage needs of its expanding customer base. We view the TEL team as a perfect partner for ADIC in this important market, and we look forward to a long and successful relationship with them."

*1 The storage systems include tape drive (26.5 billion yen) and tape automation (53.4 billion yen) (Expected 2003 results)

*2 Source: IDC Japan, 9/2003 Japan Tape drive/Tape Automation Forecast and Analysis, 2002-2007