Avnet Electronics Marketing Signs Distribution Agreement with Jennic

PHOENIX -- The Avnet Electronics Marketing Americas business region of Avnet, Inc. (NYSE: AVT) and Jennic, a global leader in the design and manufacturing of low-power wireless microcontrollers, have signed a distribution agreement. Under the terms of this agreement, Avnet will distribute Jennic’s complete line of wireless microcontrollers, FCC-approved modules, and development kits throughout the Americas.

Bolstering Avnet’s push into smart energy and green technology sectors, Jennic provides developers with a wide range of low power, wireless connectivity modules. These robust miniature modules provide Avnet’s customers with a key time-to-market advantage along with the benefits of system-level power savings. Comprised of an IEEE802.15.4 radio front-end, dedicated 32-bit processor, memory and I/O resources, the modules also integrate a complete protocol stack. Jennic’s comprehensive line of low-power solutions includes evaluation kits for developers, modules for low/medium volume production and chips for high volume production. Available industry-standard protocol stacks include 6LoWPAN for wireless IP connectivity, ZigBee® PRO for meshing and interoperability as well as RF4CE for home entertainment. Additionally, Jennic offers JenNet, a proprietary protocol optimized for ease of use and rapid application development.

“Jennic’s time-to-market oriented approach and protocol flexibility are important to our customers,” said Alex Iuorio, senior vice president of supplier business development for Avnet Electronics Marketing Americas. “Their low-power module platform can be configured to support the specific communications protocol which is best suited for each application type. When customers move to high-volume production, Jennic’s chip-level products afford scalability with little or no software redesign effort.”

“The agreement holds great synergies and is a significant enhancement for Jennic in North America,” said Tony Lucido, vice president world-wide sales and marketing for Jennic. “Avnet’s world-class design support focus and logistics capabilities will facilitate rapid progression in existing and emerging sectors, and collectively we will grow our share.”

To order Jennic products or for more information, please visit the Avnet Electronics Marketing Web site.

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About Jennic
Jennic is a fabless semiconductor company leading the wireless connectivity revolution by providing wireless microcontrollers for a broad range of applications in the energy, environment, asset tracking and consumer markets. Products include state-of-the-art low power wireless microcontrollers, modules, development platforms, protocol, application software, focusing on IEEE802.15.4, ZigBee® and 6LoWPAN standards. Jennic provides first-class sales and support worldwide. For more information, visit www.jennic.com.

About Avnet Electronics Marketing
Avnet Electronics Marketing is an operating group of Phoenix-based Avnet, Inc. that serves electronic original equipment manufacturers (EOEMs) and electronic manufacturing services (EMS) providers in more than 70 countries, distributing electronic components from leading manufacturers and providing associated design-chain and supply-chain services. The group’s Web site is located at www.em.avnet.com.

About Avnet
Avnet, Inc. (NYSE:AVT), a Fortune 500 company, is one of the largest distributors of electronic components, computer products and embedded technology in the world. Avnet accelerates its partners’ success by connecting the world’s leading technology suppliers with a broad base of more than 100,000 customers and providing cost-effective, value-added services and solutions. For the fiscal year ended June 27, 2009, Avnet generated revenue of $16.23 billion. For more information, visit www.avnet.com.