News Release

SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 23, 2002--Overland Data Inc. (Nasdaq:OVRL), today announced the appointment of Darin Richins to vice president of worldwide marketing.

Richins, who will report to Overland Data's President and CEO Christopher Calisi, was vice president of corporate marketing at Novell Corp., a world leader in networking solutions. As vice president of worldwide marketing, Richins will be responsible for worldwide corporate marketing activities including corporate branding, marketing communications and corporate events. Richins will oversee the activities of Overland's expanding global marketing programs including the Americas, EMEA and the Asia Pacific regions.

At Novell, Richins was instrumental in the development and initial implementation of Novell's one Net vision. For the last 10 years, Richins has held executive level positions overseeing corporate positioning, branding, analyst and public relations, advertising, product marketing, customer relationship marketing and Web marketing for a variety of high tech companies. Prior to joining Novell, Richins was executive vice president and western regional director of Brodeur Worldwide, one of the country's leading PR firms. Preceding this, Richins served as senior vice president of Brodeur Porter Novelli, opening a regional office in the Rocky Mountain area.

"Darin's proven background in high-tech corporate branding, product marketing programs and communications will help build momentum for Overland's next phase of growth," said Calisi. "He will play a major role in defining and implementing Overland's evolving role in today's storage marketplace."

"Overland presents a very unique combination of professional opportunities for me," said Richins. "The company is at the beginning of a new and exciting period in its history and I am pleased to be part of the team that will help shape its future."

Richins has received numerous awards for his work in communications, including the 1999 Pyramid of Honor, the 1997 Marketing Computers ICON award, 1995 Novell Marketer of the Year, and the Golden Spike award from the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA).

About Overland

Overland Data Inc. (Nasdaq:OVRL) is a global supplier of innovative data storage and storage automation solutions for computer networks. The company's reputation for delivering high availability products, as well as its award-winning SmartScale Storage(R) architecture, which set the standard for intelligent automated storage and scalability, has established Overland as a leader in the mid-range tape automation market. Overland sells its products worldwide through leading OEMs, commercial distributors, storage integrators and value-added resellers.

Except for the factual statements made herein, the information contained in this news release consists of forward-looking statements that involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Words and expressions reflecting optimism and satisfaction with current or future prospects, as well as words such as "believe," "intends," "expects," "plans," "anticipates" and variations thereof, identify forward-looking statements, but their absence does not mean that a statement is not forward looking. Such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of performance and the company's actual results could differ materially from those contained in such statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include economic conditions and technology spending levels, unexpected shortages of critical components, rescheduling or cancellation of customer orders, loss of a major customer, the timing and market acceptance of new product introductions by the company and its competitors, general competition and price pressures in the marketplace and the company's ability to control costs and expenses. Reference is also made to other factors set forth in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the "Risk Factors," "Management's Discussion and Analysis" and other sections of the company's Form 10-K for the most recently completed fiscal year. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this release and the company undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements to reflect new information, events or circumstances after the date of this release.

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