Oxford Instruments plc (‘Oxford Instruments’), the high technology tools and

systems company, today announces the disposal of its 23% holding in Oxford

Diffraction Limited (‘Oxford Diffraction’) to Varian, Inc. for a cash

consideration of £3.5m. An additional cash amount of up to £1.1m may be received

over the next three years conditional on the performance of Oxford Diffraction.

The cash will be used to reduce Oxford Instruments’ debt.

Oxford Diffraction, based in Abingdon, near Oxford in the UK, was spun out of

Oxford Instruments plc in March 2001 in order to develop, manufacture and supply

analytical instrumentation for X-ray crystallography. As this technique was not

core to Oxford Instruments it was decided to develop it as an independent

company using outside capital and resources.

Oxford Instruments has treated its holding in Oxford Diffraction Limited as an

investment, the carrying value of which was £0.3m at 30 September 2007. This

disposal will result in a non-recurring profit, before costs, of approximately

£3.2m on the initial consideration of £3.5m