November 30, 2004

PRESS RELEASE

AMERICAN ELEMENTS ANNOUNCES DEVELOPMENT OF NEW HIGH PURITY SILICON ARSENIDE PRODUCT

[November 30, 2004, Los Angeles, CA] American Elements announced today the successful development and commercial availability of a new product group of high purity (99.9999%) silicon arsenide crystal and powder products.

The commercial availability of ultra high purity silicon arsenide allows for further development of new and innovative schemes for arsenic addition to semiconductor compositions involving arsenide group crystal structures. The benefits include elimination of rapidly oxidizing arsenic metal as the means for introducing arsenic to the production scheme. This is of great value to semiconductor producers from both an environmental and quality control perspective.

American Elements is a Los Angeles based global manufacturer and developer of engineered and advanced materials with the world’s largest industrial catalogue of rare earth materials accessible electronically at www.americanelements.com. For further information on the new Chinese rare earth tax rates, please contact your local American Elements distributor or American Elements U.S. corporate headquarters at (1)310-208-0551, FAX (1)310-208-0351 or customerservice@americanelements.com.