Press Release

Newly Formed West Steag Partners Makes Investment in GuideTech

SUNNYVALE, Calif., September 26, 2001 - Guide Technology, Inc. (GuideTech), the leading innovator in high-performance time measurement instruments, today announced it has received an investment from West Steag Partners (West Steag) of Essen, Germany finishing its third round of private equity funding. The investment marks the entrance of West Steag as a venture capital investor in the semiconductor equipment industry and is the second investment the newly formed fund has made in the United States. The funds will be used for the production and extension of GuideTech's Femto family of Time Interval Analyzer (TIA) instruments and will support the Company's worldwide growth initiatives in the semiconductor Automatic Test Equipment (ATE) industry.

"We are pleased that West Steag, with their experience in semiconductor equipment, chose to invest in GuideTech," said Dr. Arnon Gat, President and CEO of GuideTech. "In addition, our ability to complete the planned round of financing affirms that our product and market strategy has delivered results. The company is now equipped to capitalize on its initial penetration in the ATE markets. We are also pleased to announce that West Steag CEO, Dr. Hans Betz, has joined GuideTech's Board of Directors. Dr. Betz brings extensive semiconductor equipment knowledge and strategy to our already strong board," commented Dr. Gat.

"Investing in GuideTech is consistent with West Steag's mission to pursue new equipment technologies that will play a major role in their markets," said Dr. Hans Betz, CEO of West Steag. "GuideTech's ability to innovate and capture key customers in ATE is very attractive to us and with an experienced management team in place we were confident to make GuideTech one of our initial US investments," commented Dr. Betz.
 

About West Steag Partners

West STEAG Partners, a Euro 100 million Venture Fund based in Essen, Germany, is a 50:50 Joint Venture of WestLB and STEAG AG. The investment focus includes Electronics, Optics, MEMS, IT, and Biotechnology. West STEAG Partners provides capital and support for young companies in high tech growth markets in the US, Europe, and Israel. Investments are generally made in various stages of a company's development but focus on expansion and bridge financing where the industry and management experience of the fund management has the greatest impact. For more information, please visit the company's web site at http://www.weststeag.com, contact West STEAG Partners at info@weststeag.com or call +49 (201) 801-2623.
 

About GuideTech

GuideTech, the leading innovator in high-performance time measurement instruments, provides advanced semiconductor products companies with the solution they need to minimize component failure and economize testing in production. The Company's Femto products accomplish this by dramatically improving test throughput via fast measurement rates and increased parallelism, and by providing the critical, high-speed timing test coverage often lacking in ATE systems. GuideTech develops, markets and supports commercially proven time interval analyzers. Headquartered in Sunnyvale, CA, and founded in 1988, the company is the first to deliver a cost-effective, high-end timing measurement solution to the production ATE market. For more information on GuideTech, please visit the company's Website at http://www.guidetech.com, or call (408) 733-6555 x240.