Tuesday January 19, 1:25 pm Eastern Time

Company Press Release

SOURCE: SciComp Inc.

Merrill Lynch Chooses SciComp's Derivative Pricing Software

AUSTIN, Texas, Jan. 19 /PRNewswire/ -- SciComp Inc., a software company focused on providing synthesis tools for the financial services industry, today announced that Merrill Lynch, one of the world's leading financial management and advisory companies, has licensed SciFinance 1.0, an options- pricing software package for quantitative analysts.

Merrill Lynch licensed SciFinance in December of 1998 after a significant testing period. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Beginning in January of 1999, Merrill Lynch's Global Equity-Linked Products Department will deploy SciFinance globally in a three-year contract, with options to renew for up to 12 years.

Based on SciComp's software synthesis technology, SciFinance automatically generates custom computer programs from concise specifications of options structures -- pricing without programming. This technology produces robust finite difference codes, which often run faster and are more accurate than traditional methods.

Elaine Kant, SciComp's founder and president, said, ``SciFinance will bring value to Merrill Lynch because it reduces the time needed to price complex derivative structures. Merrill Lynch's leading role in the worldwide derivatives market and position as a SciFinance power user will offer invaluable feedback for SciComp as well.''

Merrill Lynch will use SciFinance's generated code to value and hedge equity derivative instruments. SciFinance will enable Merrill Lynch to decrease the turnaround time for derivative model prototyping and will enable analysts to realistically tackle more sophisticated problems, said Jim Gatheral, head of quantitative analytics for Merrill Lynch's Global Equity- Linked Products department. ``I feel confident that SciFinance will significantly improve our modeling productivity,'' Gatheral said. ``We have been very happy with the service we have received from SciComp during the bench-marking process.''

Merrill Lynch is one of the world's leading financial management and advisory companies with offices in more than 40 countries and total client assets exceeding $1 trillion. As an investment bank, it is the top global underwriter and market maker of debt and equity securities and a leading strategic advisor to corporations, governments, institutions, and individuals worldwide. Through Merrill Lynch Asset Management and Mercury Asset Management the company is one of the world's largest managers of financial assets. For more information, visit the web site at www.merrilllynch.com.

Founded in Austin, Texas in 1994, SciComp is the leader in technology that empowers its customers to produce complex, mathematical software, eliminating the need for manual computer programming. SciComp's software synthesis techniques can be applied in a wide range of industries, including finance, electronics, oil and gas, pharmaceuticals, automotive and aerospace. SciComp's development team has more than 90 years of combined experience in mathematical modeling, computer science, applied mathematics, physics and engineering. For more information, call David Johansen at 512-451-1050 or visit the web site at www.scicomp.com.

SOURCE: SciComp Inc.