23 Jul 2001

APPLIED PRECISION SIGNS UNITED KINGDOM'S DATACELL, LTD. AS DISTRIBUTOR OF ARRAYWORXe BIOCHIP READER AND DELTAVISION RESTORATION MICROSCOPY SYSTEM

Products to be made available in the United Kingdom and Ireland

Issaquah, Wash., and Berkshire, England - July 23, 2001 - DataCell, Ltd., the largest independent imaging company in the United Kingdom (U.K.), will be the exclusive distributor of Applied Precision, Inc.'s arrayWoRxeTM Biochip Reader and DeltaVision� Restoration Microscopy System in the U.K. and Ireland. Thanks to DataCell's broad reach, the arrayWoRxe and DeltaVision will now be available to both British and Irish academic research and biomedical customers.

"This is an exciting opportunity for us to expand our market share in the United Kingdom and Ireland," said Joe Ahladis, vice president of sales, marketing and customer service for Applied Precision. "As a respected player in these markets, DataCell's sterling track record with local end users will only enhance our reputation in the U.K. and Ireland and give us the opportunity to market our revolutionary array technology," he added.

As the largest independent imaging company in the U.K., DataCell will act as a value-added reseller for Applied Precision's two flagship biotechnology products. DataCell's director of marketing and sales, Mark Norris, mirrored Applied Precision's enthusiasm. "We believe that our extensive distribution network will be the perfect vehicle for marketing Applied Precision's new arrayWoRxe. We're pleased to offer our customers access to the latest advances in microarray technology and restoration microscopy."

The arrayWoRxe Biochip Reader by Applied Precision is a new type of scanner that uses white light instead of lasers to illuminate microarrays, resulting in higher signal-to-noise ratios than those obtained with laser scanners. The introduction of this instrument breaks one of the last barriers in array measurement technology: the complexity of using multiple dyes at high resolution.

Applied Precision's DeltaVision offers temporal resolution up to five times that of other high-resolution restoration microscopes currently available, increasing scientists' capacity to study dynamic, molecular-level processes.

About DataCell, Ltd.
DataCell, Ltd. (www.datacell.co.uk) is the largest independent imaging company in the United Kingdom, providing solutions and components to both the scientific and industrial markets and is a value added reseller of image acquisition hardware, related software and imaging systems. It has the distribution rights in the United Kingdom, in some cases exclusive, to the product ranges of a number of well-established image processing hardware manufacturers and software developers. DataCell operates principally in the education and research, machine vision, bio-medical, security and defense sectors.

Through the provision of consultancy and systems integration services, DataCell has developed significant Image Processing expertise enabling it to provide customized imaging solutions in the form of hardware and software to OEMs, systems integrators and a variety of commercial end-users.

About Applied Precision, Inc.
Applied Precision Inc. is the leading provider of measurement, analysis and process-control systems for semiconductor test, assembly and packaging, as well as biomedical and biotechnology research and analysis (especially cell microscopy, genomics and proteomics). Applied Precision's specialized systems are based on precisionwareTM, the company's unique convergence of mechanics, electronics and software, enabling advancements in the world's core technologies. Applied Precision can be reached in the United Kingdom at +44 1672 518350 or in the United States at (425) 557-1000 and can be located on the Web at www.appliedprecision.com.