The News

Varioptic S.A and The Dow Chemical Company (TDCC) to Collaborate for the Development of New Generation Products

10/10/2006

Lyon, 10 October 2006 – Varioptic S.A and The Dow Chemical Company (NYSE: DOW) announced today that they will combine their strength and expertise to bring new developments in the field of electrowetting technology for Liquid Lenses.
The results of this partnership will significantly improve optical, chemical and physical performance of Varioptic’s liquid lenses, broadening the range of applications for liquid lens products.

“Varioptic has considerable background experience in the development of proprietary materials for liquid lens applications and significant progress has been made recently to design reliable liquid formulations for mobile phone camera modules” says Paul Morris, director, Dow Venture Capital “As Varioptic moves forward from AutoFocus applications to other applications (such as microzoom) the requirements are even more challenging. We consider TDCC’s capability in high throughput screening to be a powerful tool in helping optimize electrowetting performance for such requirements. We believe that Varioptic’s technology can become a major component of the evolution of mobile phones and we are happy to start this cooperation”.
 “The market for optical solutions in mobile phones and PDAs is poised for exponential growth, and the partnership we’ve announced today will help accelerate the development and delivery of numerous applications” says Jean-Christophe Robert, CTO of Varioptic “Combining our companies’ expertise will open up new opportunities in a wide range of applications that can benefit from such optical solutions and we are looking forward to working with TDCC to capitalize on this enormous market opportunity”
About Dow Venture Capital
Dow Venture Capital has invested over 0 million in businesses based on Life Sciences & Biotechnology; Communications & Information Technology; and Physical Sciences. Dow invests, in part, through institutional venture capital firms, and also directly in start-up companies. The Dow Venture Capital team has developed a broad network of VC partners that specialize in Dow's targeted investment markets and geographies. Dow Venture Capital's investment professionals are widely experienced in discovering new investment opportunities, and supporting portfolio companies. Territories in which Dow is actively managing investments include North America, Europe and Asia.

About Varioptic
Varioptic pioneers in designing and manufacturing electrically controlled optical liquid lenses for optical designers. In order to maintain its technology leadership, Varioptic heavily invests in R&D for the further development of innovative products for various applications. Founded in 2002, Varioptic is located in Lyon (France) and headed by Etienne Paillard, CEO. Press contacts:
Isabelle Jourdain, Communication Manager Philippe Ruffin, Product Marketing Manager
Isabelle.jourdain@varioptic.com philippe.ruffin@varioptic.com
Phone : +33 (0)4 50 32 36 01 Phone : +33 (0)4 37 65 19 35