23 MARCH 2004

PLASMON Plasmon Supplies UDO™ Drives and Media for HP StorageWorks Optical Libraries

UDO answers requirements for secure, cost-effective archival storage

Plasmon (LSE: PLM), the market leader for professional data archival solutions, announced today an agreement with HP to deploy Plasmon UDO^TM (Ultra Density Optical) drives and media in HP StorageWorks optical libraries.

Bob Wilson, vice president and general manager of Nearline Storage at HP:

"HP StorageWorks optical jukeboxes are a key component of HP's overall Information Lifecycle Management strategy to enable customers to resolve issues of data retention, compliance, and information archiving, retrieval and utilization. Incorporating UDO into HP jukeboxes not only allows us to continue to provide our customers with secure, accessible, long-term storage at an extremely attractive price, but strengthens HP's overall storage portfolio to offer customers the most effective and complete solutions for their storage and information lifecycle requirements."

Designed for organizations seeking secure retention of important information, UDO succeeds 5.25 inch MO (Magneto Optical) technology as the new professional optical storage standard. However, UDO breaks the mold for optical storage solutions with increased storage capacity and dramatically lower archival storage costs.

Peter Gerr, Analyst, Enterprise Storage Group, said:

"UDO delivers higher performance and much greater cost efficiencies to users who rely on optical storage for their long-term data archiving. With regulatory compliance mandates requiring IT organizations to retain financial, medical, and other valuable records in their original form for longer periods of time, UDO provides users a compelling choice for long-term archival storage."

Nigel Street, Chief Executive of Plasmon, said:

"The integration of Plasmon UDO drives and media into HP's line of optical libraries offers customers the best solution for long-term, permanent archival storage. UDO is extremely cost-competitive compared to magnetic disk and DVD library solutions with much greater reliability."

Enquiries

Plasmon Plc (01763 261466)

Nigel Street (Chief Executive)

Tim Arthur (Finance Director)

Citigate Dewe Rogerson (020 7638 9571)

Martin Jackson

About UDO

UDO features blue laser recording rather than the red lasers used in previous optical drives such as MO and DVD. Blue lasers achieve far greater data densities, resulting in dramatically higher media capacities. First generation UDO products have a capacity of 30GB, with capacity reaching 120GB by the third generation. Drive and media capacity are scheduled to double every 18 to 24 months. The densities achieved through blue lasers allow UDO to be priced at $2.00/GB in the first generation, one-fifth the price of MO media.

UDO media is packaged in an ISO standard 5.25 inch cartridge, allowing UDO and MO media to be supported in the same libraries, and reducing the cost of existing media migration. Future UDO drives will be backward read-compatible, minimizing future media migration expense.

The Phase Change recording technology used by UDO is field-proven and highly stable. With absolute authenticity and a media life of 50+ years, UDO meets the most demanding requirements of regulatory agencies and other authorities for the secure, long-term storage of information.

About Plasmon

Plasmon is the world leader in professional archival solutions, providing a comprehensive line of optical libraries, drives and media. Customers include corporations, institutions and government agencies worldwide and are backed by a global service and support network. Founded in 1985, Plasmon is listed on the London Stock Exchange, (LSE: PLM), and had fiscal year 2003 sales revenues of $95 million. Worldwide headquarters are in Cambridge, England with US Sales and Manufacturing based in Colorado. Plasmon has regional sales offices throughout Europe and North America. For more information, visit www.plasmon.com or www.plasmon.co.uk.

Plasmon and UDO are registered trademarks of Plasmon Plc. Copyright 2003