ARRS Arris International Plc - Ordinary Shares

SUWANEE, Ga., Sept. 3 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The Irish Minister for Labour Affairs, Billy Kelleher TD, today announced that ARRIS Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:ARRS) of the U.S., which develops and manufactures voice, video, and high-speed data products for the global cable TV industry, is to undertake a strategic Research and Development investment for high value video products for the cable industry at its Irish operations in Cork. The euro 4.5 million investment, supported by IDA Ireland, will strengthen the R&D effort in Cork by adding new skills and technologies that will significantly advance the potential for technical innovation within the Company's Irish operations. Minister Kelleher said, "This is excellent news as the investment is leading-edge R&D and will further secure the existing ARRIS operations and employment at the Cork site. It again demonstrates the ability of Irish based R&D operations to contribute cutting-edge and highly complex solutions as part of a parent company's strategic future development plans. This project will represent a major shift for ARRIS into higher value video products for the cable industry, which is viewed as a key area for growth in the coming years. The decision to locate such a strategic investment at the Cork site was influenced by its success to date, for which the Cork management and workforce are to be congratulated." ARRIS will use the investment to improve its existing D5(TM) Universal EdgeQAM (UEQ) along with the R&D required to increase its large volume manufacturing capability and quality to the scale and stringent levels demanded by ARRIS and its customers. Universal EdgeQAMs are now being introduced into cable networks around the world to provide the increased capacity, needed especially for unicast video services. More and more Video on Demand and Switched multicast and unicast services are being deployed and the ARRIS D5 UEQ supports all these services, including the DOCSIS 3.0 data services standard for delivering 100 Mbp/s+ services currently being deployed by a growing number of cable networks. ARRIS Communications Ireland Ltd., located at the Cork Airport Business Park, employs 52 people doing leading-edge R&D work into embedded products for cable networks. The Irish R&D team's skills include full turnkey hardware development of RF products, embedded software, testing and integration, as well as contract manufacturing management. This investment will further endorse the Cork operation's position as a Centre-of-Excellence for the development of video products within ARRIS. The Cork operation, formerly Com21 Ireland Ltd, was established in 1999 and was acquired by ARRIS in mid-2003. The operation, with previous IDA Ireland R&D support, has successfully developed several products, including the D5 Universal EdgeQAM. "With the additional investment, we will develop solutions across a number of areas that will allow us to increase our production output significantly, reliably and to the highest degree of quality," said Charles Cheevers, ARRIS CTO, Europe. "This requires significant R&D in new techniques to manufacture high speed RF-based Video and Data products and to create new test technologies and platforms to meet the increasing technology and cost expectations of our customers worldwide." About ARRIS ARRIS is a global communications technology company specializing in the design, engineering and supply of technology supporting triple- and quad-play broadband services for residential and business customers around the world. The company supplies broadband operators with the tools and platforms they need to deliver reliable telephony, demand driven video, next-generation advertising and high-speed data services. ARRIS products expand and help grow network capacity with access and outside plant construction equipment, reliably deliver voice, video and data services and assure optimal service delivery for end customers. Headquartered in Suwanee, GA, USA, ARRIS has R&D centers in Atlanta; Chicago; State College, PA; Beaverton, OR; Wallingford, CT; Cork, Ireland; and Shenzhen, China, and operates support and sales offices throughout the world. Information about ARRIS products and services can be found at http://www.arrisi.com/ DATASOURCE: ARRIS CONTACT: Alex Swan, ARRIS Media Relations, +1-678-473-8327, ; or Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment- Press Office, 01- 6312200; IDA Ireland - Ruth Croke, Press & PR Manager, 087 4195051, Web site: http://www.arrisi.com/

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