LOS ANGELES, Feb. 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Cullen/Frost Bankers, Inc. , a financial holding company, with headquarters in San Antonio, Texas, and Ronald A. Katz Technology Licensing, L.P., headquartered in Los Angeles, announced today the settlement of patent litigation between the parties and that, as part of the settlement, Cullen/Frost Bankers, Inc. has agreed to pay an undisclosed sum for a nonexclusive license under a comprehensive portfolio of patents that Katz owns relating to interactive voice applications.

The nonexclusive license covers services offered by Cullen/Frost Bankers, Inc. and The Frost National Bank in the "Financial Services Call Processing" Field of Use including customer service delivered through automated systems and live agents. Other terms of the license were not disclosed.

The patents held by Ronald A. Katz Technology Licensing, L.P. cover a wide range of interactive technology including automated forms of: customer service, prescription refill services, securities trading, merchandising, prepaid services, telephone conferences, registration, home shopping, as well as functions involved in securing information from databases by telephone, interactive cable transactions, and various other uses of toll free and local numbers.

Ronald A. Katz stated, "We welcome Cullen/Frost Bankers, Inc. to the dozens of financial services companies who have purchased license rights under this portfolio."

There are over 150 companies with license rights under this portfolio, including over 15 energy and utility companies. Companies with license rights under this portfolio include: Advanta Corp., Alltel Corporation, American Century, American Express, Ameritrade Holding Corporation, Automatic Data Processing, Inc., AT&T Corp., Bank of America Corporation, BB&T Corporation, Capital One Services Inc., Cellco Partnership d/b/a Verizon Wireless, Certegy Inc., Dell Inc., Delta Air Lines, Inc., Edward D. Jones & Co., L.P., Equifax Inc., Excel Communications Inc., First Data Corporation, First National Bank of Omaha, First Tennessee National Corporation, Hewlett-Packard Company, Home Shopping Network Inc., Household International, Inc., HSBC Bank USA, International Business Machines (IBM), KeyCorp, LaSalle Bank Corporation, MCI Inc., Mediacom Communications Corporation, Mellon Financial Corporation, Merck & Co., Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc., Metris Companies Inc., Microsoft, MoneyGram Payment Systems Inc., Nationwide, OppenheimerFunds, Inc., People's Bank, PetMed Express, Inc., The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc., Principal Financial Group, Inc., Prudential Financial, Inc., QVC, Inc., Sears, Roebuck and Co., Shop At Home, Inc., Sprint Corporation, SouthTrust Bank, Sunoco, Inc., Synovus, T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc., The Vanguard Group, Inc., Verizon California Inc. and its affiliates, Wachovia Corporation, and Wells Fargo & Company.

Mr. Katz is the named inventor on a large number of patents primarily in the fields of telecommunications and computing. He also formed Telecredit, Inc., the nation's first on-line real time credit and check cashing authorization system, and was awarded a patent as co-inventor of that technology.

Cullen/Frost Bankers, Inc. is a financial holding company, headquartered in San Antonio, Texas with assets of $13.2 billion as of December 31, 2006. The corporation provides a full range of commercial and consumer banking products, investment and brokerage services, insurance products and investment banking services. Its subsidiary, Frost Bank, operates more than 100 financial centers across Texas in the Austin, Corpus Christi, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, Rio Grande Valley and San Antonio regions. Founded in 1868, Frost is one of the largest banks based in Texas and has been helping Texans with their financial needs during three centuries. Cullen/Frost Bankers' stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "CFR".

CONTACT: Brian Rivette of A2D, L.P., +1-310-247-8191,
brivette@a2dlp.com, for Ronald A. Katz Technology Licensing, L.P.