September 18, 2000

Franklin's eBookman® MultiMedia Reader and Content Player Will Support VoiceAge's ACELP®.net Audio Compression Technology

Burlington, N.J. and Montreal, Canada- September 18, 2000-- Franklin Electronic Publishers, Inc. (NYSE:FEP), the world leader in eBooks, and VoiceAge Corporation, specialists in the digital processing of voice and audio, today announced that Franklin's new eBookman® multimedia reader and content player will support VoiceAge's ACELP®.net low bit-rate compression technology. The VoiceAge codec will enable eBookman® users to hear audio books from Audible, Inc., as well as other audio materials.

Gregory J. Winsky, Executive Vice President of Franklin, said "Franklin is pleased to partner with VoiceAge to bring low bit-rate speech compression technology to eBookman®. This partnership complements our alliance with audible.com by which thousands of audio books will become available to eBookman® users. With technology from VoiceAge and the breadth of audible's titles, eBookman® is well positioned in the nascent market for the highly portable, yet low priced, spoken word electronics. "

Laurent Amar, Vice President of Business Development at VoiceAge Corporation termed the quest for bandwidth, storage capacity, quality of service and cost issues, as being among the industry's top challenges. ``More than anything, the deployment of digital distribution of audio over the Internet, ignited by MP3, has generated high enthusiasm but also exposed the urge for high quality, low bit-rate compression technology for storage and streaming applications,'' he remarked. ``ACELP®.net is now filling that gap on the web and this agreement with Franklin broadens the use of this technology on the Internet and in the rapidly growing category of portable digital audio players. eBookMan®, with its remarkable feature set and amazing low price points, has the potential to expand this marketplace very quickly, and we are thrilled to be part of eBookMan®'s launch," Amar added.About Franklin Electronic Publishers, Inc. www.franklin.com

Franklin is the worldwide market leader in handheld electronic books, including the popular BOOKMAN® series. The Company is also the exclusive producer and distributor of ROLODEX® Electronics brand of personal information management products. Franklin has sold more than 23,000,000 electronic books and currently publishes more than 200 titles, including dictionaries and bilingual dictionaries; encyclopedias; Bibles; entertainment titles; education and tutorial publications; and medical reference works. Franklin products, available in sixteen languages, are sold in 45,000 retail outlets worldwide, through catalogs and on line at www.franklin.com.

About VoiceAge Corporation.

Based in Montreal, Canada, VoiceAge as a spin-off company of Sipro Lab Telecom Inc., draws on a wealth of expertise and strategic partnerships, that allowed them to be awarded eight internationally recognized telecommunications standards. VoiceAge was launched to meet the evolving needs of customers and industries alike searching for alternative solutions in the proprietary standards area of voice and audio codecs.

The ACELP® Technology (Algebraic-Code-Excited Linear Prediction), owned by VoiceAge and developed by Université de Sherbrooke and Sipro Lab Telecom Inc., has become a de facto standard in the realm of voice applications in over 240 million PCs in worldwide, notably through the widespread usage of RealPlayer® and Microsoft Media Player® applications.

Over the last decade, ACELP® Technology was positioned in several International Telecommunication standards and integrated into more than 300 million cellular phones worldwide, notably through: GSM EFR (ETSI), PCS 1900, IS 136 (TIA, North American TDMA), IS 95 (TIA, North American CDMA), TETRA, G.729 and its Annexes, as well as G.723.1.

About eBookMan®

Franklin will ship three eBookman® models this fall, ranging in suggested retail price from USD$129.95 to USD$229.95 All models will feature a large 240 x 200 pixel LCD that displays 87% more information than a typical handheld while still fitting in your shirt pocket. Additionally, each model is designed to download electronic books and audio books, support MP3 music, and synchronize bundled PIM applications with Microsoft Outlook.

About ACELP®.net

Designed around the famous ACELP® technology, already at the core of most low-bit rate of international and national cellular telephony standards, VoiceAge Corporation's ACELP® related codec is widely recognised as being one of the primary compression algorithm for high-quality encoding of speech content at low bit rates. ACELP®.net, when encoding spoken word audio at 16 Kpbs, is comparable to MP3 at 64 Kpbs, shortening download time and extending playback time by as much as 4x. Except for the historical information contained herein, the matters discussed throughout this release, including, but not limited to, those that are stated as Franklin's belief or expectation or preceded by the word "should" are forward looking statements that involve risks to and uncertainties in Franklin's business, including, among other things, the timely availability and acceptance of new electronic reference products, organizers, and computer companion products, changes in technology, the impact of competitive electronic products, the management of inventories, Franklin's dependence on third party component suppliers and manufacturers, including those that provide Franklin-specific parts, and other risks and uncertainties that may be detailed from time to time in Franklin's reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.For additionnal information contact:

For more information please contact:

Franklin Electronic Publishers, Inc.
Gregory J. Winsky
Executive Vice President
(609) 386-2500
greg_winsky@franklin.com