Zi increases penetration in China's domestic market

News release

Zi increases penetration in China's domestic market

Calgary, AB (December 20, 2000) - Zi Corporation's (NASDAQ: ZICA) (TSE: ZIC) eZiText™ technology is now licensed to 80 per cent of China's designated domestic GSM manufacturers as a result of the latest licensing and royalty agreement with Guangzhou Southern High Tech Co., Ltd. The agreement with Southern High Tech covers the use of eZiText™ in Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese and English.

"With certification under China's newest text entry standards, Zi Corporation's eZiText™ leads the market in intuitive interface solutions for Chinese text-input,?says Gary Kovacs, president, Zi Corporation. "Our share of China's domestic market clearly indicates that Zi Corporation has earned the confidence of manufacturers.

Compliance with all the necessary national standards is an important factor in creating a competitive handset product. eZiText™ was evaluated and received certification under the GB/T18031 and GB18030 standards. Zi's software met all the coding standards and allowed for quick character-entry, out-performing the standard requirements.

Zi's predictive software has been licensed to domestic manufacturers such as Eastern Communications Co. Ltd., Shenzhen Zhongxing Telecom Co. Ltd, Xiamen Overseas Chinese Electronic Co. Ltd., TCL Corp., Konka Group and Ningbo Bird Co. Ltd.

Southern High Tech is a new entrant to the handset manufacturing industry with the establishment of the Southern High Tech Digital Mobile Phone Development Centre in Guangzhou.

Zi Corporation is a market-driven technology company focused on developing and delivering intelligent interface solutions and services to the wireless and consumer Internet spaces. The company's core technology product, eZiText™ connects people to short messaging, e-mail, e-commerce, Web browsing and similar applications in almost any written language. The company's service division provides market-leading engineering design in Bluetooth, VoIP and man-machine interface. Zi supports its strategic partners from offices in Calgary, Beijing, Hong Kong, San Francisco, Shenzhen, Stockholm and Tokyo. A publicly traded company, Zi Corporation is listed on the NASDAQ National Market (ZICA) and the Toronto Stock Exchange (ZIC).

Certain statements in this press release constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The information in this press release is based on Zi Corporation's current expectation and assumptions, and is subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated. Such risks include, among others, general business and economic conditions and competitive actions as well as the risks and uncertainties referred to in Zi Corporation's 20-F for the most recent calendar year.

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For further information, please contact:

Randy Henderson
Zi Corporation
Vice President, Finance
Phone: (403) 231-4580
Email: investor@zicorp.com
Website: www.zicorp.com

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