ICSCRM Expects Record Attendance in Pittsburgh
CompoundSemi News StaffSeptember 15, 2005...ICSCRM,
the International Conference on Silicon Carbide and Related Materials 2005
gets underway in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA Sept. 18th. The week long event
is regarded as the preeminent technical forum to discuss new research results
and assess the true “state of the art” for silicon carbide (SiC), gallium nitride (GaN),
and other related wide bandgap semiconductors. General Chairperson for this
year's event, which is held ever other year, alternating venues in the USA,
Europe and Asia, is Ms. Laura Rea of Wright Air Force Labs. Ms. Rea is a familiar
and especially popular person in the compound semi industry. She has been a
longtime technology champion for the wide bandgap semiconductors and has spoken
extensively inside and outside the USA government on the merits of utilizing
leading edge compound semi materials and components for defense-related and
commercial applications.
According to Ms. Rea, 550 international technologists are already pre-registered
for the event, and organizers expect another 100-150 to register on-site next
week. "This is about the same size as ICSCRM '99 in North Carolina
(which was the last time the event was held in the USA). As always, it will
be a truly international conference, with approximately two thirds of the attendees
from Europe and Asia. The conference banquet will be held at the Carnegie Museum
and Music Hall and will be a wonderful opportunity for international colleagues
to relax and catch up on the latest news." As those of us who attended
past ICSCRM (pronounced "ice cream") events know, Cree traditionally
hosts a significant social event every year at ICSCRM, and 2005 will be no different.
"Details are still a surprise," says Ms. Rea, "but
if the event in 1999 was any indication, ICSCRM attendees can expect lots of
fun." Cree, considered an industry leader in SiC and GaN technology
creation and deployment for a variety of electronic and light emitting applications,
hosted a huge blowout party in '99 for all attendees when ICSCRM was held in
their home territory in North Carolina, and Cree's party in Washington DC in
'93 and later in Japan remain memorable to veteran attendees (as do the collector-item
T-shirts).
Other companies will be hosting special events as well. Dow Corning, for example,
will be hosting an innovative railroad theme RSVP party called "Follow
Our Signal" at the Gandy Dancer Restaurant Monday, Sept. 19th. The complete
technical program for this year's ICSCRM and other pertinent information can
be found on the ICSCRM
website.
Super Vision Taps Mike Bauer as Pres/CEO - Brent Kingstone to ChairmanSeptember 15, 2005...On the heels of losing a major IP-related litigation summary judgment to one of the SSL industry's leading advanced LED systems integrators, Color
Kinetics (ref: Aug.
22 coverage), news out of Super Vision of Orlando, Florida USA is that
the founder, president and CEO, Brent Kingstone, will step away from the command
position January 1, 2006 and move to chairman of the board of the company. Kingstone
is being replaced by Mike Bauer. According to information in the company
news release, Mr. Bauer has led the lighting sales and marketing efforts
for several Fortune 500 companies. Previous positions include VP of sales for
Cooper Lighting, VP of sales for Lighting Corporation of America, director of
marketing and product development for Lumark/McGraw-Edison and "cross functional
experience" with GE Lighting Systems. Toshiba Claims Best Performing GaN Power FET at 6GHz
Scott McMahanSeptember 15, 2005...Toshiba has announced the development of a Gallium Nitride (GaN) power field
effect transistor (FET) that achieved 174W of power output at 6GHz. The company
claims that the device out performs all other devices for power output at 6Ghz.
In addition the company says it has eight times the power density of gallium
arsenide (GaAs) FET’s widely used in base stations for terrestrial and
satellite microwave communications.
The company says it optimized the epitaxial layer and chip structures for 6GHz-band
operation by adopting a four-chip combination structure to minimize heat build-up.
Toshiba says it will continue to refine the technology for the target of sample
releases next year. The new FET is expected to become a key component in microwave
communications replacing the GaAs devices. The new GaN power FET and its technology
will be presented at the International Conference on Solid State Devices and
Materials (SSDM), from September 12 to 15 in Kobe, Japan. Company
News Release
In other company news, Hitachi Ltd said it's in talks to set up a plant by
2007 with Toshiba, Japan's second-biggest chipmaker, and other electronics companies.
Toshiba's spokesman Keisuke Ohmori declined to comment at that time, according
to a Bloomberg article. Toshiba Corp chairman Tadashi Okamura said
in the article that it's "too early" to discuss starting
a made-to-order semiconductor factory in Japan.
September 15, 2005...Bookham Inc. headquartered in San Jose, California USA, has completed the sale
of vacant land in Wiltshire, United Kingdom to Abbeymeads LLP for $15.5 million.
"This transaction is another step in Bookham's continuing execution of its
financing plan," said Dr. Giorgio Anania, president and chief executive officer
of Bookham, Inc. In addition to the land sale to generate money, the company will sell 9.2 million
shares of common stock at the price of $4.12 per share. (Ref: SEC form
S-3 ), Company
News Release Cree Awarded Air Force Contract
CompoundSemi News StaffSeptember 14, 2005...Cree has been awarded a five-year, $15 million contract from the Air Force
Research Laboratory to develop processing techniques to switch from 3-inch to
100mm (4-inch) substrates for silicon carbide (SiC) microwave monolithic integrated
circuit (MMICs). The larger wafers will reduce the cost of production, the company
said. According to the company, the research will build on the completed phase
I of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA’s) Wide Bandgap
Semiconductor Technology Initiative and its recently started phase II in which
the company has demonstrated success working on 100 mm high purity SiC substrates.
(Ref: article)
"By increasing yields and moving to larger wafer formats, Cree is leading
the effort to significantly reduce production costs of SiC MMICs for military
applications as well as discrete SiC MESFETs for commercial applications such
as WiMax," notes John W. Palmour, Cree's executive vice president of Advanced
Devices. “Cree's previous work on a 3-inch SiC MMIC program for the Office
of Naval Research, announced in 2002, resulted in the launch of the world's
first SiC MMIC foundry service, which is now being used by multiple defense
contractors for the realization of wide bandwidth high power amplifiers,”
he said. Company
News Release Lamina Signs On as Sponsor for LRC's LED Lighting Institute
LIGHTimes StaffSeptember 13, 2005...Lamina Ceramics of Westampton, New Jersey USA has become a a sponsor of
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's (RPI) Lighting Research Center (LRC)'s LED Lighting Institute, the next session of which is slated for September 21-23, 2005, at RPI. In
addition to sponsoring the LED Lighting Institute, Lamina will also donate its
super-bright LED light sources for use in the design of architectural lighting
fixtures. Lamina joins a prestigious cadre of sponsors that includes: Color Kinetics, GELcore, Lumileds Lighting, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, Nichia America, Opto Technology Inc., Osram Sylvania, PolyBrite Intl., and the US DoE. Content continues for LIGHTimes SecondPage members... Japan Steps-up Energy Conservation MeasuresSeptember 12, 2005...As oil prices rise around the world, many countries have stepped-up their conservation efforts. Many governments like Japan, subsidize energy saving measures. Japan’s Environment Ministry will offer subsidies to pay for up to one-third of the costs of installation incurred by companies and stores that switch to LEDs for their lighting needs starting fiscal 2006, according to Nikkei Net Interactive. In a separate effort, Japan’s Ministry of Economy Trade and Industry (METI) has recently extended its energy conservation government subsidies to include transport companies. Companies receiving the subsidies will be required to meet carbon dioxide reduction targets. According to the article Japan’s energy consumption is up 19% from its 1990 levels. The industrial sector reported a 14% increase. The transport industry had a 19% rise. TFS Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy
CompoundSemi News StaffSeptember 12, 2005...In an attempt to stay in business, Three Five Systems (TFS) has filed a voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy with the US Bankruptcy Court in Arizona. The company said it plans to sell off its assets and subsidiaries. According to the company, its foreign subsidiaries are not part of the bankruptcy filing. Its TFS Electronic Manufacturing Systems already filed bankruptcy. There is no word yet on the court supervised “reorganization” of the company’s contractual and debt obligations.
The company reports that it is working with potential interested buyers for the company’s assets, and therefore does not expect to need post-petition financing. TFS does not plan to file Form 10-Q for the period which ended June 30. At the end of April and again at the end of May Three Five Systems received a notice of delisting from the New York Stock exchange because its stock price fell below the minimum $1.00 per share. Then the company’s common stock was delisted from the NYSE on June 10. The stock was then listed on the OTC bulletin board. TFS Electronic Manufacturing Services, Inc. (TFSEMS), signed a definitive agreement to sell the assets of its electronic manufacturing services (EMS) operations in Redmond, Washington, to Catalyst Manufacturing Services, Inc. in August.
Company News Release JDSU Acquires Agility Communications; Adds Digital Signal Analysis Products
Scott McMahanSeptember 9, 2005...JDS Uniphase has signed an agreement to acquire Agility Communications, Inc.,
a provider of tunable lasers and transponders. JDSU says the acquisition will
help give it a broad, end-to-end optical network portfolio. Agility communications
is a privately held company with about 90 employees in Santa Barbara, California.
The deal is expected to close in the fiscal quarter ending December 2005. The
terms of the agreement were not disclosed. JDSU says that unlike alternative architectures,
Agility offers the only proven architecture capable of full tunable laser integration
with a modulator using a highly scalable semiconductor wafer process. According
to the company, the platform also offers switching speeds of less than 10 milliseconds,
and is less sensitive to shock and vibration than other solutions, thus enabling
deployment of robust, highly reconfigurable, and scalable optical networks.
"We believe the shift to tunables is inevitable and that the transition
will be rapid," said Mike Ricci, vice president of JDS Uniphase's
Component and Modules Group. "Agility's single chip monolithic platform
is capable of addressing the entire market and is not limited to a single form
factor. Agility's proven architecture, coupled with JDS Uniphase's scalable
manufacturing capability, paves the way for high volume, tunable, pluggable
solutions." Company News Release
In other company news, JDSU added Multicast Analysis capabilities to its DTS
digital video services test and measurement solution.
In a related bit of news, Australia Broadcasting Corporation has upgraded its
digital signal analysis and measurement tool to the JDSU’s DTS-200. The
JDSU DTS-200 adds several features the previous test solution the DTS-100 including
MPEG analysis for bandwidth efficiency and more advanced audio analysis tools.
Another company, Harmonic, a provider of broadband optical network and digital
video systems, has also chosen to upgrade not the DTS-200 and DTS-330. The DTS-330
is reportedly the company’s “one box” solution offering several
different combinations of MPEG (digital video broadcast, or DVB, and advanced
television systems committee, or ATSC) transport stream generation, capture,
creation, and analysis. The DTS multicast analysis feature will be on display
at International Broadcasting Convention 2005, September 8-14, Amsterdam, Netherlands,
RAI Convention Center, Hall 8, Booth 8.314. Cree to Open Asia-Pacific Subsidiary Headquarters in Hong Kong
LIGHTimes StaffSeptember 8, 2005...Cree Asia-Pacific Limited, a subsidiary of Cree Inc. of Durham, North Carolina
USA, will open its new headquarters in the Hong Kong Science Technology Park on
September 12, 2005. Cree Asia-Pacific was formed to increase customer and technical
support in the region while also serving as Cree’s product innovation center
for the region. The company says it will host a dedication ceremony to introduce
its new Asian customers and prospective customers to the new staff and facility. Content continues for LIGHTimes SecondPage members... Our news features are reported
by the CompoundSemi News staff writers.
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