Axcelis Announces Key Design Win at Major Asian Memory Chipmaker For New Optima HD Imax Molecular Implant System
Industry's first single wafer high dose implanter to deliver power of molecular implants for advanced memory and logic devices

BEVERLY, Mass. — October3, 2006 — Axcelis Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: ACLS) has received a new design win for its Optima HD, powered by Imax^TM , from one of the world's largest manufacturers of memory devices.   The newest tool in Axcelis' Optima ion implant family, the Optima HD Imax enables users to dramatically increase productivity and shorten low energy, high dose implant process times by implanting molecules instead of atoms.   This order marks a significant new win for Axcelis' new Optima HD technology at another one of the world's top five memory chipmakers and the first penetration of Axcelis' innovative Optima HD Imax molecular implant system.   The tool will ship during the fourth quarter of 2006.

"We're excited to announce this new design win at one of the industry's largest memory manufacturers," said Mary Puma, chairman and CEO of Axcelis.   "Customers today face increasing pressure to reduce costs and improve process yields, as they continue to scale to smaller geometries.   The Optima HD Imax's enabling technology allows customers to achieve productivity goals faster, making advanced applications, like dual poly gates, economically viable and risk-free.   The Optima HD Imax is based on proven, traditional implant platform technology, which provides high levels of precision and allows simple implementation without complex integration issues."

The Optima HD Imax implants molecules of B₁₈ H₂₂ , which includes 18 boron atoms, resulting in higher productivity than users could achieve with traditional approaches, without the risk of energy contamination associated with beam deceleration.  This boost in productivity enables chipmakers to adopt a number of emerging trends, including dual poly gate applications for advanced memory devices and shallower junctions in logic chips.

Since the late 1990s, Axcelis has been developing molecular source technology and its potential for extending low energy implant technology.   The company is using ClusterIon^TM source technology from SemEquip, a manufacturer of ion sources and ion delivery systems for the OEM implanter market.

About Axcelis Technologies, Inc.
Axcelis Technologies, Inc., headquartered in Beverly, Massachusetts, provides innovative, high-productivity solutions for the semiconductor industry. Axcelis is dedicated to developing enabling process applications through the design, manufacture and complete life cycle support of ion implantation, rapid thermal processing, and cleaning and curing systems. Axcelis Technologies has key product development centers in Beverly, Massachusetts, as well as in Saijo, Japan through its joint venture, SEN Corporation, an SHI and Axcelis Company. The company's Internet address is: www.axcelis.com.

Forward-Looking Statements
This press release includes certain statements, known as "forward-looking statements," which express the current expectations of Axcelis management. Product manufacturing and delivery issues, customer order push-outs or cancellations and product performance could cause actual results to differ materially from those currently anticipated as expressed in this press release. These risks and other risk factors relating to Axcelis are described more fully in the most recent Form 10-K filed by Axcelis and in other filings from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

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