Alfalight Receives $1.36 Million Army Contract to Develop 1 kW Laser Diode Pump Source
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 29, 2008...Alfalight Inc., a maker of high-power laser diodes based in Madison, Wisconsin USA, reported that it has received a $1.36 million, 12-month contract from the Army Research Laboratory (ARL) in Adelphi, Maryland. The program entitled "High Brightness Diode Sources II" (HiBriDS II), will extend Alfalight's success with previous programs to create more reliable solid state laser diode pump sources with higher brightness than current technology. According to the company, the goal of the program is to demonstrate 1 kW of 975 nm narrowband, wavelength-locked diode laser light coupled into a 600 um, 0.22 NA fiber. Alfalight contends that the new design be more cost effective and robust compared to fiber-coupled lasers because it will require less-demanding manufacturing tolerances and fewer optical components to scale power. Furthermore, Alfalight says that instead of micro-channel cooling, only industrial water cooling will be required.
"Alfalight's past performance in DARPA's ADHELS (Architecture for Diode High Energy Laser Systems) and ARL's HiBriDS programs has allowed us to push both the spatial and the spectral brightness of pump diodes by implementing brightness enhancement and wavelength-stabilization technologies," said Manoj Kanskar, vice president of Research and Development at Alfalight. "The extended scope of HiBriDS II will allow us to make a significant improvement to the brightness and power of cost-effective kilowatt-class pump modules."
Company News Release October 29, 2008...Concentrix Solar, a maker of solar concentrator technology, and Abengoa Solar, a maker of silicon-based solar cells, connected a 2 MW solar plant to Spain's public utility grid. Concentrix uses fresnel lenses to concentrate the sun's rays 500 times and triple-junction solar cells. Its modules use three different types of cells that are stacked on one another to cover different parts of the solar spectrum. Abengoa Solar uses silicon flat modules. Both types of cells are mounted on tracking systems. According to the companies, it is the first combination solar power plant of its kind. The installation uses 19 of Concentrix Solar's FLATCON trackers which tilt the solar cells to face the sun directly as the sun moves across the horizon.
The companies connected the solar power station under the still valid version of the Real Decreto 661 / 2007, the first Spanish feed-in tariff law. The power station is installed in Sanlúcar la Mayor near Seville on grounds belonging to Abengoa Solar. The companies reportedly plan to have a total power of 300 MW installed at the power station by 2013. At that time it will be enough to power 153 000 houses in the Seville region with electricity.
The CEO of Concentrix Solar, Hansjörg Lerchenmüller stated, “Casaquemada is an important step for us to show that FLATCON is a competitive technology and an alternative to conventional photovoltaics technology. The technology has proven itself in a commercial power plant, clearly demonstrating that a mature state has been reached."
Concentric Solar News Release AWR and UMS to Begin “Try the Power” GaAs MMIC Design Incentive ProgramOctober 29, 2008...AWR and United Monolithic Semiconductors (UMS) have announced an incentive program that the companies hope will allow new customers to get MMIC design prototypes to market sooner. Under the "Try the Power" program new customers of AWR and UMS will get a free 90-day lease for AWR's Microwave Office electronic design automation (EDA) software. Also under the program, new customers will receive the UMS PPH25X foundry process design kit. Additionally, customers can utilize a reduced-rate prototype development quickturn (PDQ) shared-wafer foundry run using the UMS' PPH25X process. The program commences November 15, 2008, and runs through May 31, 2009.
AWR says its Microwave Office software has all the essential tools for high-frequency design including: linear and non-linear circuit simulators, electromagnetic (EM) analysis tools, integrated schematic and layout, statistical design capabilities, and parametric cell libraries with built-in design-rule check (DRC). AWR boasts that its software delivers unprecedented ease-of-use, openness, and interoperability, as well as integration with best-in-class tools for each part of the design process.
UMS says that its PPH25X pseudomorphic high electron mobility transistor (pHEMT) process offers a high breakdown voltage, which provides power density up to one watt per millimeter of gate periphery. UMS contends that the high performance of the PPH25X process (45GHz of Ft), makes it especially useful for power design at very high frequencies.
United Monolithic Semiconductors News Release
RFMD Extends Broadband GaAs pHEMT Amplifiers Family
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 29, 2008...RFMD of Greensboro, North Carolina USA, added four new broadband GaAs pHEMT amplifier integrated circuits (ICs) to its SUF family of products for the Aerospace and Defense (A&D) market. RFMD notes that the new ICs are also applicable to telecom infrastructure, optical network, and test and instrumentation markets. RFMD says that the SUF-7000, -8000, -8500 and -9000 die-level GaAs pseudomorphic heterojuction transistor (pHEMT) amplifiers extend the operational frequency range of the company's product family, which now covers DC to 20 GHz. The four pHEMT's also deliver multiple combinations of P1dB, gain, and linearity performance. The company points out that in many A&D applications die-level amplifiers are preferred because they offer superior high-frequency performance compared to packaged parts, they enable flexibility for integration, and help end-product designers to achieve smaller board layouts. RFMD said it will release packaged versions of select SUF family amplifiers for production during the first quarter of 2009.
"Given the broadband frequency performance requirements of our defense customers, we are able to simultaneously deliver a family of new high performance ICs which address both military and non-military opportunities with the same IC solution," said Jeff Shealy, vice president and general manager of RFMD's Aerospace and Defense Business Unit. "Intelligent re-use of RF circuit design combined with our Optimum Technology Matching (OTM(TM)) strategy are key to our ability to accelerate penetration in multiple RF markets."
Company News Release HelioVolt Opens Thin-Film Solar Factory in Austin, Texas; Wins Award
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 27, 2008...HelioVolt, a thin-film copper indium gallium diselenide solar company, has officially opened its new manfacturing facility in Austin, Texas. The company has a specialized reactive transfer printing process for CIGS solar thin films called FASST. The process can reportedly apply the CIGS film onto traditional building materials.
The process is innovative enough to win an award from R&D Magazine. The Editor’s Choice Award for Most Revolutionary Technology was given to HelioVolt for its FASST printing process and to the NREL for its ink jet deposition technique for solar thin films. (Heliovolt News Release).
The new 122,400 square foot LEED (Leadership in Energy Efficiency and Design) certified facility will be the first for the company. It will employ 160 people and it will implement the company's FASST thin-film printing process. It reportedly delivers 12 percent conversion efficiency solar thin films in a mere six minutes. The company hopes that it will put the cost of solar electricity in parity with the cost of grid electricity.
"Integrating environmental sustainability, new green jobs and technology innovation, HelioVolt is precisely the type of emerging leader in the global renewable energy industry that this city values," said Austin Mayor Will Wynn.
"Clean and renewable energy technologies likely represent the single greatest economic opportunity of our generation," said HelioVolt's CEO and Founder, Dr. B.J. Stanbery. HelioVolt News Release Finisar Opens High-Volume Manufacturing Facility in China
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 27, 2008...Finisar, a maker of fiber optic subsystems and network test systems, announced that it has opened its new manufacturing and R&D facility in Shanghai, China. According to Finisar, the new 15,000 square meter facility was designed specifically for high-volume, cost-effective optics production. It will also be used to furthers research and development efforts. Finisar says that it will enable lower-cost manufacturing of the company's advanced optical components including lasers and passive devices.
Shanghai dignitaries and Finisar executives were on hand for the opening ceremony. Finisar invested $3 million in the new facility that will be staffed with 650 from the local area. According to the company, it will have a clean room, office space, and nearly three times the capacity of the company's previous facility. The company says that the active and passive components to be manufactured at the facility will go into the company's transceivers as well as the merchant market. Finisar reports that it has already completed product qualification and is in full operation at the new site.
"We are excited to open this facility and further expand our operations in Shanghai, China, as this represents a very important market in the fiber optics industry," said Joe Young, senior vice president and general manager of Optics at Finisar. "By being vertically integrated with our other manufacturing sites around the globe -- Fremont, CA and Ipoh, Malaysia, for example -- this facility is now a part of a larger operation committed to the volume production of high-quality optical components."
Company News Release TriQuint Commercializes New Millimeter Wave Foundry Processes
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 27, 2008...TriQuint of Hillsboro, Oregon USA, introduced two new 150 mm gallium arsenide (GaAs) processes for millimeter wave (mm wave) applications. According to TriQuint, TQP25 and TQP15 are pseudomorphic high electron mobility transistor (pHEMT) processes, which utilize optical lithography technology to reduce cost compared to traditional E-beam-based solutions. TQP15 and TQP25 join the company's previously announced and fully released TQP13 process. Now, TriQuint says its commercial foundry pHEMT offerings for the entire range of mm wave frequencies. TQP25 is currently available in limited release, and TQP15 will be in limited release at the end of Q408.
TQP25 enables the design of high throw count switches, Ku-band power amplifier designs, and an enhancement/depletion (E/D) process. High throw count switches like those used in the growing 3G WCDMA mobile handset market enable access to multiple frequency bands from a single antenna, thereby reducing the overall RF front-end footprint. According to TriQuint, TQP25 allows levels of integration not typically available in this frequency range for the Ku-band and E/D process. TQP15 is targeted at the emergent Ka-band segment and is ideal for the VSAT, satellite communications, and point-to-point radio markets.
“TriQuint’s new 0.15µm and 0.25 µm processes will help the VSAT industry address future trends that include implementation of Ka band-based broadband services, which we see as a growth area, as well as target other commercial millimeter-wave markets with cost effective solutions,” said Asif Anwar, program director of the GaAs service at Strategy Analytics. TriQuint News Release Bookham Achieves First Ever Quarterly Profit
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 27, 2008...Bookham Inc. of San Jose, California USA, an optical component supplier, showed a profit for the first time since the company's founding. Bookham reported that for the first quarter of fiscal 2009, it had a net income of $2.2 million. This is up $4.7 million from the net loss of $2.5 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2008. It is also up $2.9 million from the net loss of $0.7 million from the previous quarter. The company's revenues were up 6 percent compared to the previous quarter and up 23 percent compared to the same quarter a year ago.
“We executed another quarter of financial improvement, including record revenue and Adjusted EBITDA. Our progress with product innovation and operational execution drove these results,” said Alain Couder, president and CEO of Bookham, Inc. “The economic environment is reducing demand from some of our customers. Our priority remains unchanged: to achieve sustained operating profitability.” Company Financial Results for Q1 of Fiscal 2009
Fujitsu Laboratories Develops Highest Output Power Gallium-Nitride HEMT Power Amplifier
CompoundSemi News StaffOctober 22, 2008...Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd. (Fujitsu) of Kawasaki, Japan, announced the development of a new high-efficiency, high-output amplifier based on gallium-nitride (GaN) high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs). The company boasts that it produces over 300 watts (300W) of power in the C band, with 60% efficiency of power conversion.
Fujitsu points out that using GaN HEMT technology allows more than 6 times the output power of existing amplifiers using gallium-arsenide (GaAs) transistors.
The company says it expects the PA will extend radar detection range by 2.4 times. Fujitsu anticipates that replacing the traveling-wave tube amplifiers commonly used for high output power applications with this new technology will enable smaller, lighter, more energy-efficient, and longer-lasting transmission systems for applications including satellite communications, next-generation mobile phone base stations and radar. According to the company, the large and heavy vacuum tube-based traveling wave tube amplifiers cannot be effectively replaced by GaAs transistors because they a much lower breakdown voltage. Company News Release Our news features are reported
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