21.1% Stake Taken in ASP Technology International

NewMedia SPARK PLC
21 March 2000


          NewMedia SPARK invests £2,000,000 in ASP
                Technology International Ltd.

NewMedia SPARK plc ('SPARK') announces that it has agreed to
invest  £2,000,000  for  a  21.1  per  cent.  stake  in  ASP
Technology International Ltd.

Key Points

  *    ASP Technology International Ltd.  ('ATI') is a fabless
     semiconductor company designing Integrated Circuit ('IC')
     devices   for  the  digital  image  processing  market.
     Applications include computer vision, scanning and sensing.

  *     The  Company will use the investment to establish  a
     marketing and sales infrastructure in the USA and expand the
     market and sales operations in the European Union.

  *    The Company offers unique very high-performance cost-
     effective  programmable ICs and boards into industrial,
     medical  and scientific markets and it will expand  its
     product range into the office equipment digital imaging
     markets.

  *     The Company is positioning itself to enter - with  a
     proven  technology - the emerging consumer markets  for
     Internet appliances and digital interactive television with
     programmable designs for digital image content creation,
     delivery and display.

  *    Last summer, the Company's technology was used in the
     creation of a visualisation workstation with the highest
     known performance for the US Naval Research Laboratory in
     Washington, D.C.

Commenting  on  the  investment,  John  Bolitho,   Assistant
Director of NewMedia Investors, Adviser to SPARK, said:

'We  are  pleased to have arranged an investment in  ATI  on
behalf of SPARK.  Over the past 10 years, the founders  have
developed a very interesting suite of intellectual  property
and  products  in  the  area  of  parallel  processing.   As
convergence of telecommunications and computing  is  driving
increased  demand for this sort of application,  we  believe
the time is right for this technology to be commercialised.'


John   Lancaster,  CEO  and  Co-founder  of  ASP  Technology
International Ltd., said

'Processing  of visual information will be the key  to  next
generation  Internet appliances.  With this  investment  the
company will provide the market with the enabling technology
for  such  products.  We are delighted to  be  working  with
SPARK at this exciting stage in our company's growth.'

David  Lee, formerly of Acorn plc, will be joining the Board
as  non-executive Chairman. John Bolitho will be joining the
Board as a non-executive director representing SPARK.

ASP  Technology  International Ltd. is the  24th  investment
announced  by NewMedia SPARK since its shares began  trading
on the Alternative Investment Market on 28th October 1999.

For further information please contact:

Michael Whitaker                               0468 555944
NewMedia SPARK plc                           [phone]

Lisa Baderoon / Tim Anderson
Buchanan Communications                      [phone]