CUPERTINO, Calif. -October 18, 2000 - Symantec Corp. (Nasdaq: SYMC), a world leader in Internet security technology, today announced the eighth consecutive quarter of record revenues and earnings. Strong sales in the consumer market contributed to net revenue of $192.3 million for the second fiscal quarter 2001, ended September 29, 2000. This represents an increase of 14 percent, on a pro-forma basis, over the same quarter a year ago.

Earnings per share before acquisition related amortization and one-time charges for the second quarter was $0.72, 38 percent higher than the same quarter last year. Net income before acquisition related amortization and one-time charges for the second quarter was $45.8 million, 47 percent higher than the September quarter last year. All figures exclude the results of operations from the company's divestiture of the Visual Café and ACT! product lines.

"We are continuing to transform the company," said John W. Thompson, Symantec chairman, president and CEO. "Our core anti-virus solutions for the enterprise continued to grow faster than the overall market, with a 34 percent increase in revenues over the same quarter last year. In addition, our multi-product suite offerings in the consumer market grew 148 percent as compared to the September 1999 quarter."

Worldwide consumer business accounted for 55 percent of revenues in the September 2000 quarter, an increase of 19 percent compared to a year ago. Enterprise revenue grew eight percent from the same quarter a year ago.

In the September 2000 quarter, international revenue represented 44 percent of total revenue. Overall, the European region grew 11 percent, the Japanese region grew 21 percent and the Latin American region grew 86 percent compared to the September quarter a year ago.

Quarterly Highlights

• Symantec announced the acquisition of AXENT Technologies, Inc. in a stock-for-stock exchange.
• Symantec also signed strategic infrastructure agreements with several hardware companies. Intel desktop boards and Toshiba's line of cable modems are all protected by Symantec's anti-virus and Internet security technologies.
• Symantec launched several new or updated versions of their consumer and enterprise software including Norton Internet Security 2001, Norton Personal Firewall 2001, Norton AntiVirus 2001, Norton Ghost 2001, Symantec Ghost 6.5 Enterprise, Norton SystemWorks 2001, Norton CleanSweep 2001, Norton Utilities 2001 and Symantec Desktop Firewall 2.0. All products are Windows ME compatible.
• With the release of Norton Internet Security, Symantec created an entirely new category of personal protection software. According to PC Data, it has captured 67 percent of the retail market volume and 78 percent of the retail category revenue during September. Norton Internet Security is also number six on PC Data's top selling business software list.
• Symantec also reaffirmed its commitment to provide enterprise security solutions at both the gateway and at the desktop with the release of Symantec Desktop Firewall 2.0. This segment continues to be an area that large customers have budgeted IT dollars for this year.
• Symantec products continue to receive awards and recognition. This quarter, PC World named Norton AntiVirus the Best Product of 2000. Smart Business awarded Norton AntiVirus their Editor's Pick Award and added it to the "A" List, a listing of products recognized as best in their class. Norton AntiVirus also won its 11th Virus Bulletin 100% Award and received the coveted Checkmark Level Two certification from West Coast Labs. Norton Personal Firewall received Computer Shoppers' Best Buy Award. Symantec's Web support site was named one of the year's ten best by the Association of Support Professionals and SARC.com was named one of the top Web sites for small business by Entrepreneur Magazine.
• Symantec continues to expand its international presence by opening new offices in Spain and Belgium. Symantec also opened two new online stores for Spanish and Portuguese-speaking customers.

Conference Call
Symantec has scheduled a conference call for 4:30 p.m. EDT today to discuss fiscal second quarter results. Interested parties may access the conference call on the Internet through Vcall at www.vcall.com. To listen to the live call, please go to the Web site at least 15 minutes early to register, download and install any necessary audio software. Dial-in numbers have also been set up. The number for domestic listeners is 1-800-946-0785, while international listeners can dial 719-457-2661. The passcode for both numbers is "Symantec."

Consolidated Fianancial Statements

About Symantec
Symantec is the world leader in providing solutions to help individuals and enterprises assure the security, availability, and integrity of their information. Headquartered in Cupertino, Calif., Symantec has operations in more than 40 countries. More information is available at www.symantec.com.

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Symantec, the Symantec logo, VERITAS, and the VERITAS logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Symantec Corporation or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of the individual companies and are respectfully acknowledged.

FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENT: This press release contains forward-looking statements that involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to differ materially from results expressed or implied by this press release. Such risk factors include, among others: the anticipation of the growth of certain market segments, the positioning of Symantec's products in those segments, the competitive environment in the software industry, general market conditions, fluctuations in currency exchange rates, changes to operating systems and product strategy by vendors of operating systems, dependence on other products, the importance of new Symantec products, and difficulties experienced in completing the acquisition of Axent Technologies, Inc. and the integration of Axent's and Symantec's respective businesses. Actual results may differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements in this press release. Additional information concerning these and other risk factors is contained in the Risk Factors sections of the Company's previously filed Form 10-K for the year ended March 31, 2000 and Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2000.