Louisville, Colorado, April 11, 2003—Three more cable home networking products achieved certified status for CableHome™ 1.0 in CableLabs® Certification Wave 25, which concluded this week. The companies achieving certified status for residential gateways were Ambit, LinkSys and Thomson, Inc.

CableHome is a CableLabs®-managed initiative that provides the consumer with a secure and managed residential gateway that can be connected to the cable network in a plug-and-play fashion. It builds upon the already successful Data over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS®) project that has helped launch deployment of more than 25 million high-speed, always connected, interoperable cable modems internationally. Hundreds of cable modems have achieved DOCSIS certified status. This announcement marks the conclusion of the second CableHome certification wave and there now are five certified CableHome devices.

CableHome, coupled with cable broadband service, allows for distribution of broadband service throughout a consumer�s home. The initiative offers the consumer a secure and managed residential gateway and offloads much of the technical burden inherent in home networking from the consumer to the cable operator.

Ralph Brown, Broadband Access Vice President and CableLabs Chief Software Architect, said CableHome continues to advance rapidly. �Cable�s broadband platform, with DOCSIS and CableHome, offers consumers great choice, control and convenience,� Brown added.

CableHome 1.0 provides a number of effective and friendly home network trouble-shooting tools, which in many cases will enable the cable operator to remotely detect and resolve customer home networking issues. In addition, CableHome 1.0 helps ensure customer privacy, as it does not provide the ability to query or configure consumer devices, such as PCs, within the home. CableHome 1.0 also helps protect the customer from hackers attempting to gain unauthorized access to their wireless home network.

The home network service support tools the operator receives in a CableHome-compliant residential gateway enable improved customer support and relationships, and increases the efficiency of customer care operations. CableHome 1.0 provides standardization of home networking functionality within a residential gateway, allowing for deployment of a single common back office support infrastructure, and providing a multiple supplier environment. CableHome 1.0 has also been internationally standardized within the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) as Recommendation J.191.

CableLabs® Certified™ or CableLabs Qualified means that the device has passed a series of tests for compliance with the indicated version of the CableHome Specification and has thus demonstrated interoperable functionality with any other "CableLabs certified/qualified" device. Many of these devices provide other functions or are designed to comply with other specifications, in each case tailored by the manufacturer to meet the growing needs of consumers or cable operators in an evolving communication/entertainment sector. While CableLabs encourages such innovation and diversity, the phrase CableLabs certified/qualified should not be understood as an endorsement of these other attributes (or that the product is certified to other specifications or versions), which are solely the responsibility of the company making the additional claims.

About CableLabs: Cable Television Laboratories (www.cablelabs.com) was founded in 1988 by members of the cable television industry. A non-profit research and development consortium, CableLabs delivers innovations that enable cable operators to be the providers of choice in their markets. Cable operators from around the world are members. CableLabs maintains web sites at www.cablelabs.com; www.packetcable.com; www.cablemodem.com; www.cablenet.org, and www.opencable.com.

CableLabs® is a registered trademark of Cable Television Laboratories, Inc. Other CableLabs marks are listed at http://www.cablelabs.com/certqual/trademarks. All other marks are the property of their respective owners.