mental images Joins Global Consortium To Establish 3-D Internet Standard

Berlin/San Antonio, July 23, 2002 - - mental images®, the global leader in high end rendering software, has joined major users and suppliers of the worldwide Computer Aided Design (CAD) industry and standards bodies in a project to establish an open standard for viewing and manipulating three-dimensional (3-D) data from multiple sources over the Web. The ability to work effectively with 3-D images is essential for the competitiveness of companies in many industries, including industrial design, engineering, manufacturing and the increasingly important area of product lifecycle management.

The absence of a widely accepted and flexible standard for viewing and handling 3-D data on the Web has restrained innovation and the adoption of new business solu-tions. Creating 3-D standards for the Web is expected to reduce the cost, time and complexity associated with developing and deploying Web-based 3-D content. It will also provide CAD users with a more efficient and cost-effective way to collaborate and share data in many business areas.

At the leading global annual computer graphics conference, Siggraph 2002, the forma-tion of the "CAD 3-D Working Group" was announced under the leadership of Intel Corporation. Other members include Adobe, Boeing, Dassault Systèmes and Micro-soft, as well as the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology. mental im-ages is the only German company, and one of three European ones, that was invited to join the group.

Today there is still a considerable cacophony in 3-D data formats. As corporate users large and small are increasingly demanding a greater degree of compatibility and inter-changeability among CAD tools, especially with regard to Web-based platforms, the CAD 3-D Working Group's charter over the next 18 months is to discover, define, develop and deploy an industry standard, open format and player for 3-D on the Web.

"mental images will contribute its more than 15 years of experience in visualizing CAD data from many sources and vendors to the CAD 3-D Working Group", said Rolf Herken, President and Director R & D of mental images. "This will enable the deployment of new 3-D solutions for CAD users, including new forms of Web-based collaboration."

The CAD 3-D Working Group was established within the Web3D Consortium. See www.web3d.org for more information.

mental images®, founded in 1986, is a recognized international leader in providing rendering technology to the entertainment, computer-aided design, scientific visualiza-tion, architecture, and other industries that require sophisticated images. The main product of the company is the high performance photorealistic rendering software mental ray® which is capable of running on a wide variety of platforms ranging from workstations and networks of workstations to parallel supercomputers, producing images of unsurpassed realism. mental images GmbH & Co. KG is a privately held company based in Berlin, Germany, with a subsidiary in San Francisco, California. See www.mentalimages.com for more information.

Contact:
Silvia Hanko
mental images GmbH & Co. KG
Fasanenstrasse 81, D 10623 Berlin, Germany

Telephone: +49 (30) 31 59 97-0
Telefax: +49 (30) 31 59 97-33

office@mental.com
http://www.mentalimages.com