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Ismap has just concluded the second part of a US$ 7 million pool



Marseille, 6th June 2001 - Ismap, a leading provider of mobility localisation technologies and services, today announced the completion of the second of its financial pool. It has opened its capital to GemVentures, the Gemplus Group's risk capital fund.
This financial pool, which M-Commerce Ventures, EDB Ventures, and Axa Placement Innovation joined in March 2001, totals 7 million Dollars.

"We are very pleased to welcome GemVentures as a new investor. This marks an important milestone in our company's development. The capital increase will allow us to boost our services for mobile operators in Europe and Asia, and to continue developing our offer with new mobility services. Our shareholders, consist of a world class wireless fund in M Commerce Ventures and leading finance company, a leader in the financing of operations in Asia, and a world telecommunications leader, bring the complementary elements and strength needed to succeed in our sector", states Pascal Lorne, CEO of Ismap.

Ismap, began its business activity in 1997, based on the concept of proximity portals. Together with "iti", it remains the leader in France for map-making on the web, and represents the company's technological shop window. Over the last year it has evolved and is now focusing its activities on the supplying of technologies to telecom operators.

"Thanks to the experience that we have gained over the past three years, by delivering over twenty million maps to the public, Ismap is probably the only company with a good knowledge of final users' needs, and who can offer operators a technology that has been tried and tested in real operating conditions, in other words that is resistant to very high loads", adds Pascal Lorne.

"Ismap owns a technology that is very complete and robust from the servers to the clients; it also has a great deal of operational experience in content aggregation. Ismap is one of a very limited number of companies already able to provide operators with mobility services on the web, through wap and SMS and on electronic assistants", remarks Marc Chancerel, investment manager for GemVentures. He concludes by saying that "with this know-how, ready-to-use solutions can be offered to operators to enhance their value added services, such as yellow pages directories or mobility services for GSM or GPRS. In this sense it is certainly one of the most attractive company that we've looked at in this sector".

"Geo-location technology is a key component of location-based services in the mobile commerce value chain. Its importance will be increasingly relevant with the evolution of wireless technology. Ismap, thanks to its patented technology, which 250 partners and clients have already installed, is extremely well placed to become a leader in this market", observes Edmund Yong, Senior Investment Manager for EDB Ventures.


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About Ismap
Founded in 1997, Ismap has developed a technological platform that can be used with several media, is accessible via the web, mobile phones and PDAs, and is intended for mobile telecoms operators and mobility portals.
Ismap's innovative applications are an effective response to the main concern of telephone operators, namely increasing the famous average revenue per user. Ismap's technology has already been chosen by leading companies such as Vivendi, AOL, Accor, Casio, Compaq and Texas Instruments. The company's head office is located in Marseille, France. The company is also represented in Singapore.

For more information: http://corporate.ismap.com & www.ismap.com


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About GemVentures
Created in spring 2000, with an initial operating capital of 75 million dollars, GemVentures - the Gemplus Group's risk capital fund - aims to boost the chip card market by investing in start-ups with promising futures across Europe, the USA and Asia. With minor shareholdings of around 2 to 5 million Euros, Gemplus' strategic approach has achieved evident success: barely 9 months after it was created, GemVentures has become a shareholder in nine companies. GemVentures uses Gemplus' vast business network to assess investment opportunities in an accurate way. Unlike traditional Risk Capital Companies, GemVentures has the advantage of offering more than just a financial shareholding to "GemVentures Partners". A true partnership begins, so that portfolio companies benefit not only from a financial contribution, but also from technical support, from joint marketing operations, and most of all from better visibility on the market. GemVenture provides an offer that is tailor-made for the growth of the chip card "world".

For more information: www.gemventures.com


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About EDB Ventures & M-Commerce Venture
The Mobile Commerce Venture Fund (MCVF) is a global focus wireless fund and its strategic investors/partners include Infosys Technologies, Siemens Ventures Capital, Global-TIMES-Ventures Holding GmbH (GTV), Creative Technology Ltd, Infocomm Investments Pte Ltd, Keppel T&T, FLV Fund, Pacific Century Regional Developments Ltd and PSINet Ventures Ltd.
Both the EDB Ventures and M-Commerce Venture are managed by EDB Investments.

For more information : www.edbi.com.sg


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About Axa Placement Innovation
AXA Private Equity is a Management Company, covering all the branches of Risk Capital. Driven by the historical entrepreneurial spirit of the AXA Group, this Company, exclusively dedicated to non-quoted investments, manages or advises 2.6 billion Euro. Axa Placement Innovation is the Investment fund of AXA Private Equity, specialised in the HighTech branch.

For more information : www.axaprivateequity.fr


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About Gemplus
GEMPLUS: the world's leading smart card solutions provider

Since its creation in 1988, Gemplus International S.A.(Euronext: Sicovam 5768 and NASDAQ:GEMP) has driven the global marketing and deployment of smart card-based applications for telecommunications, financial services and e-business security.

Gemplus is instrumental throughout the value chain - chip design, card management systems, software development, and consulting - delivering integrated custom-made solutions for the security, personalization and privacy management needs of clients and partners worldwide.

Gemplus technology has played a defining role in the development of wireless telephony since the introduction of SIM cards into the GSM standard in 1990. For more than a decade, Gemplus has pioneered applications that enable network operators around the world to answer the changing needs of their customers. Gemplus was first to market with a 3G card and supplies a product range compliant with new and emerging transmission standards - 2.5G, 3G.

In 2000, revenue was 1.205 BE, up 57% from the previous year's 767ME. Net income was 99 ME. Gemplus employs more than 7800 people in 37 countries worldwide.

Since 11 December 2000, Gemplus shares have been trading on Euronext Paris S.A. First Market and on Nasdaq in the form of ADSs.


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Contacts
Ismap Communication Department, Delphine Huttel
Tel: 33 491 95 50 46
email: delphine.huttel@ismap.com

GemVentures, Séverine Percetti
-Tel: 04 42 36 67 67
email: severine.percetti@gemplus.com

EDB Ventures & M-Commerce Venture, Simon Lee
Tel 65 832 6965
e-mail : yewming@edb.gov.sg

Axa Placement Innovation, Sylvie Denebourg
Tel : 33 (0)1 55 37 46 77

©2001 Gemplus All rights reserved. Gemplus, the Gemplus logo and GemSense are trademarks and service marks of Gemplus S.A. and are registered in certain countries. All other trademarks and service marks, whether registered or not in specific countries, are the property of their respective owners.