Around the Circuit
John J. Powell , founder of Sun-Tech Marketing, died May 27 in Scottsdale, AZ. He was 59 years old. Powell held senior management positions at Microwave Associates, where he began his career, and at Omni-Spectra Inc. He will be sorely missed by his many friends and colleagues in the industry.
Dr. Robert E. Goldwasser , president of TelGaAs Inc., died June 6 in St. Louis. He was 53 years old. During his distinguished career, Goldwasser worked at Microwave Associates, Varian, Alpha Industries and Monsanto Co. He was one of the cofounders of Central Microwave Co. and founder of TelGaAs. In addition, Goldwasser was the author of more than 80 papers and held several patents. Memorial contributions may be made to the St. Louis Children's Hospital.
INDUSTRY NEWS
Electronic component manufacturer ITT Cannon , Santa Ana, CA, has acquired IC card packaging manufacturer Great American Gumball Co. ITT Cannon will use Great American Gumball's technology in its ultrasonic welded IC card packaging for use in the small form factor and PC card markets. The company's Star Card line of PC card kits now will be available in three packaging varieties, including covers that are ultrasonically welded, snapped together or resistance welded.
UK-based The General Electric Company plc (GEC) has announced that its GEC Marconi North American subsidiary is acquiring Tracor Inc. for approximately $1.4 B. The agreement has been unanimously approved by GEC's board of directors and Tracor, and is conditional upon the satisfaction of required US regulatory approvals. The transaction was expected to close in June.
Mitec Telecom Inc. has purchased land in Pointe-Claire, Quebec, Canada for a new 80,000-square-foot facility, which will house the company's manufacturing and engineering operations and serve as its new corporate headquarters. Construction on the site is scheduled to begin this year with occupancy anticipated for the spring of 1999.
Germany-based quartz crystal manufacturer Herbert C. Jauch has established a new sales office to serve customers in North America. Jauch USA will offer standard and professional quartz crystals as well as oscillators, filters and ceramic resonators. The new facility is located at 8126 Brookwood Farm Rd., Fulton, MD 20759 (301) 497-7670, fax (301) 776-7979 or e-mail: info@jauchusa.com.
In an attempt to improve its recognition in the commercial and financial markets, Semiconductor Packaging Materials Co. Inc. , Armonk, NY, has changed its name to SEMX Corp. In related news, SEMX's Polese Co. subsidiary has entered into a technology and patent license agreement with Aluminum Company of America to acquire certain license rights related to aluminum silicon carbide fabrication for defined applications, including IC packaging. The terms of the agreement were not released.
SGS-Thomson Microelectronics has announced it is changing its name to STMicroelectronics in an effort to adopt a new corporate identity. The previous name reflected STMicroelectronics' two predecessor companies, SGS Microelectronics and Thomson Semiconducteurs , which provided the technological, operational and human foundations upon which the present company was built.
Advanced Switch Technology has expanded and relocated in an attempt to reduce production lead times significantly and continue to respond quickly to customer delivery needs. The company is now located at 694 Fortune Crescent, Kingston, Ontario, Canada (613) 384-3939, fax (613) 384-5026.
Melles Griot Photonics Components Division has moved to a new 60,000-square-foot facility located at 16542 Millikan Ave., Irvine, CA 92606 (800) 835-2626 or (714) 261-5600, fax (714) 261-7790 or e-mail: mgsales@irvine.mellesgriot.com.
Norton Performance Plastics Corp. has opened a new 22,000-square-foot Polymer Technology Center at its corporate headquarters at 150 Dey Rd., Wayne, NJ 07470-4699 (973) 696-4700, fax (973) 696-4056. The $2.2 M center will provide multidisciplinary support for Norton's 11 decentralized research and development teams located worldwide; undertake long-term, high impact projects to develop proprietary polymer materials and processing technology; and research glass and plastic composites for Saint-Gobain , Norton's parent company. The center spans two stories with room for expansion and includes a raw material mixing and compounding area; a pilot processing area with extruders; injection molding and calendering equipment; and laboratories for new product development, physical and mechanical properties, and optical devices.
Varil-L Co. Inc. has completed a seven-month expansion program that doubled its facilities space to 78,000 square feet. Administration, marketing, sales and a future automated assembly facility for high volume commercial subscriber products have moved to one of the four new buildings located in Denver, CO. The company's former 20,000-square-foot headquarters now houses expanded manufacturing and engineering for signal processing and hybrid products. The remaining buildings are scheduled to house an 18,000-square-foot facility for the manufacture of medium and low volume commercial signal sources, and a 10,000-square-foot facility for research and development.
Alcatel and Integrated Telecom Express Inc. (ITeX) have signed a licensing and manufacturing agreement for Alcatel's asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) technology. The terms of the agreement call for ITeX to manufacture Alcatel's industry-standard discrete multitone (DMT) chipset solution and develop new universal ADSL products. Both companies will also work to accelerate the completion of universal ADSL standards. In related news, Alcatel, Analog Devices and Texas Instruments have announced they will conduct interoperability testing among their ADSL silicon solutions. The companies hope the initiative will accelerate ADSL service deployment worldwide by creating an open marketplace for equipment manufacturers through multiple sources of standards-based silicon that function together across silicon platforms. The project will allow the three companies to validate interoperability based on DMT at the physical layer and concentrate on link and network layer interoperability based on asynchronous transfer mode transport. In addition, Analog Devices has announced that telecommunications networking solutions manufacturer Newbridge Networks is using its model AD20msp910 ADSL chipset to build high density digital subscriber line capability into the MainStreetXpress series model 36170 multiservices switch and model 27020 ADSL modem.
CommQuest Technologies Inc. , Encinitas, CA, has signed a product development and manufacturing agreement with Korea-based telecommunications company Pantech Co. Ltd. for the development of a dual-band Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) 900/1800 handset and a GSM 900 cellular handset. Future plans include the development of a world telephone using CommQuest's new tri-band GSM chipset.
Crucial Technology , a part of Micron Technology Inc. 's semiconductor group of companies, is now providing memory upgrades through Dell Computer 's on-line software and accessory program. Dell customers now can purchase Crucial Technology's high quality memory modules through Dell's Web site at http://www.dell.com or by calling (800) 999-3355.
Elanix Inc. , Westlake Village, CA, has announced that its SystemView by Elanix" software is being integrated with Xilinx's Core Generator to automate the methodology for digital signal processing (DSP) designs in field-programmable gate array (FPGA) devices. The combination provides an intuitive point-and-click design approach that enables rapid development of high performance DSP applications highly optimized for layout in Xilinx FPGAs.
RF Monolithics Inc. (RFM) , Dallas, TX, and Spectrum Microwave Products (SMP) , Norcross GA, have signed an agreement appointing SMP as a distributor of RFM's low power surface acoustic wave-based components.
Trimble Navigation Ltd. , Sunnyvale, CA, has announced that TruePosition Inc. , a wholly owned subsidiary of The Associated Group , has selected the company's Global Positioning System clock for its emergency 911 system. As a part of the TruePosition wireless location system, Trimble's Thunderbolt will provide precise timing synchronization between location receivers to locate an emergency caller's handset. In related news, Trimble's Software and Component Technologies and Printed Circuit Assembly operations have been certified to the ISO 9001 quality system standard.
Amplifier Research (AR) , Souderton, PA, has acquired the intellectual property rights to UK-based MA Instruments ' MAC cells micro anechoic test chambers. AR is upgrading the four cells (which have been renamed ARcells) to improve field uniformity and increase field strength and frequency range. The cells will be available both as stand-alone units and as systems, and will be accompanied by instrumentation and software for precompliance CE marking.
Microwave and mm-wave product manufacturer QuinStar Technology Inc. , Torrance, CA, has acquired the Silicon IMPATT diode inventory, manufacturing rights and equipment from Raytheon Systems Co. The product line was formerly owned and operated by Hughes Aircraft Co.'s GaAs Operations , which had offered the devices commercially since 1971.
Application-specific IC manufacturer American Microsystems Inc. (AMI) , Pocatello, ID, has announced it will comply with Department of Defense (DoD) mandates by migrating current MIL-STD-883 devices to its Qualified Manufacturer's Listing (QML) program. QML complies with the DoD's MIL-PRF-38535 performance-based specification. Under QML, chip manufacturers are validated to use their existing quality systems and best commercial practices (BCP) that meet or exceed military requirements. AMI will phase out internal MIL-STD-883 and Hi-Rel plastic manufacturing flows over the next 19 months and expand its QML offering to further integrate BCPs into the manufacturing flows for both ceramic and plastic packages.
The Electronic Industries Association (EIA) has changed its name as part of the organization's attempt to broaden its scope in the industry. The new Electronic Industries Alliance encompasses more than 2100 member companies and several key sector organizations, and offers specific product sector organizations the opportunity to join and participate as part of a larger united entity while maintaining their separate identity and independence. In related news, the EIA's JEDEC Solid State Technology Division has launched a new engineering committee focused on microelectromechanics. The JC-17 committee will address the need for standards in this emerging technology, which deals with the integration of micromachined silicon structures with other semiconductor devices on the same chip to produce a system function. All organizations contributing to JC-17's development that are not presently members of JEDEC can participate free of charge for the first year of committee operation. For additional information, contact J. Mark Bird, committee chair (602) 821-5000, ext. 7736 or e-mail: mbird@amkor.com.
Test solution and equipment manufacturer Noise Com has become a full member company of the CDMA Development Group (CDG), a nonprofit trade association dedicated to the worldwide development and implementation of code-division multiple access (CDMA) technology. As a member of CDG, Noise Com will actively participate in steering committee meetings and the worldwide standards group to promote the development of a universal family of standards and products based on IS-95 technology. In related news, the company's CDMA test equipment and software have been selected by the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association for use as the exclusive testing platform in its certification program, which is conducted in conjunction with the CDG.
GaAs circuit manufacturer ANADIGICS Inc. , Warren, NJ, has been awarded a patent entitled "Method and Apparatus for Providing Grounding to Microwave Circuit by Low Impedance Means" (US patent no. 5,736,913), which provides a cost-effective means to negate the impedance of bond wires on microwave circuits. The patent covers an electrical circuit that provides localized high frequency grounding on high frequency circuits. In related news, the company is celebrating the manufacture and shipment of over 100 million GaAs ICs since its founding 13 years ago.
Semiconductor processing, assembly and testing business Minco Technology Labs , Austin, TX, has been named 1998's National Subcontractor of the Year by the Small Business Administration. The company was nominated by Raytheon Systems Co. with which it has had a 17-year partnership.
Aydin Telemetry , a division of Aydin Corp. located in Newtown, PA, has been certified to the ISO 9000 quality system standard.
The North American headquarters of coaxial, microwave and fiber-optic product manufacturer Radiall Inc. has received ISO 9001 certification.
Palo Alto, CA-based Watkins-Johnson Co. has announced that its model R1910C in-building personal communications service (PCS) repeater has been type certified by the Federal Communications Commission. The over-the-air CDMA repeater provides coverage to shopping malls, airports, multistory buildings, small site applications and other indoor locations where PCS signals may be obstructed.
FINANCIAL NEWS
Tracor Inc. reports sales of $290.7 M for the first quarter, ended March 31, compared to $297.5 M for the same period last year. Net income was $11.7 M (43¢/share), compared to $279 K (1¢/share) (due to a nonrecurring extraordinary loss of $10 M caused by debt refinancing) for the first quarter last year.
Andrew Corp. reports sales of $196.9 M for the second quarter, ended March 31, compared to $202.2 M for the same period last year. Net income was $24.1 M (27¢/share), compared to $25.5 M (28¢/share) for the second quarter last year.
Stanford Telecommunications Inc. (Stanford Telecom) reports sales of $153.3 M for the year, ended March 31, compared to $167 M last year. Net income was $5.2 M compared to $8 M (61¢/share) for 1997. Sales were $40.4 M for the fourth quarter, compared to $43.1 M for the same period last year.
Aydin Corp. reports sales of $26.1 M for the first quarter, ended April 4, compared to $26.9 M for the same period last year. Net loss was $24.1 M ($4.64/share), compared to a net loss of $4.3 M (83¢/share) for the same period last year. The company attributes this year's losses to charges for arbitration and the resultant restructuring that focused on core telemetry and communications businesses.
ANADIGICS Inc. reports sales of $18.8 M for the first quarter, ended March 29, compared to $22.9 M for the first quarter last year. Net loss was $1.1 M (7¢/diluted share) (due to a $1.1 M (pretax) nonrecurring charge on an after-tax basis related to a workforce reduction), compared to a net income of $3.2 M (23¢/diluted share) for the same period last year.
Microwave Power Devices Inc. reports sales of $11.4 M for the first quarter, ended March 31, compared to $10 M for the same period last year. Net income was $183 K (2¢/share), compared to $3 K (0¢/share) for the same period last year.
Merrimac Industries Inc. reports record sales of $5.8 M for the first quarter, ended April 4, compared to $4.3 M for the same period last year. Net income was $428 K (26¢/diluted share), compared to $278 K (18¢/diluted share) for the first quarter last year. In addition, the company's board of directors recently declared a 10 percent stock dividend to stockholders of record as of May 15, which was scheduled to be distributed in June.
CONTRACTS
The US government has exercised the first of four one-year options, valued at $8.7 M, for continued services under its Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS) Operations Control System Support Services (DOCS3) contract with Stanford Telecom , Sunnyvale, CA. DOCS is a complex collection of network management and control subsystems used as tools for managing DSCS ground station and space communication payload assets. The latest option calls for Stanford Telecom to provide on-site support for operations and maintenance, software, integrated logistics, training and depot services at 12 worldwide DSCS sites through January 1999.
M-tron Industries Inc. , Yankton, SD, has been awarded two contracts totaling $3.8 M. The first contract from a network switching equipment manufacturer is valued at $1.5 M and calls for M-tron to supply clock oscillators, voltage-controlled crystal oscillators, temperature-compensated crystal oscillators and quartz crystals. The second contract from an infrastructure equipment supplier is valued at $2.3 M and calls for M-tron's full line of frequency-control products to be supplied over the next 10 months.
Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) , Palo Alto, CA, has received a multimillion-dollar contract from the US Navy that calls for the supply of HP Infinium series high performance oscilloscopes. HP will provide a potential quantity of 5000 model HP 54825A Infinium scopes to the Navy's Mechanicsburg, PA-based Inventory Control Point over a five-year period.
PERSONNEL
David C. Miller has been named president of Litton Industries' Airtron unit, succeeding Robert Lagno , who has been appointed director of business development at the company's Electronic Components and Materials Group. Previously, Miller was a program manager at the company.
Vinod Dham has been named president and CEO of Silicon Spice Inc. Prior to joining the company, Dham was group VP at AMD.
Aerovox Inc. has elected Sherel D. Horsley chairman to replace former president and CEO Clifford H. Tuttle , who is retiring. Currently, Horsley is senior VP and marketing manager of Texas Instruments Inc.'s Digital Imaging Group. The company also has named Timothy J. Brown senior VP, marketing and sales. Most recently, Brown was VP, marketing and sales at Alberox Corp.
SEMX Corp. has named Douglas G. Sages CFO and executive VP, finance. Sages is replacing Andrew A. Lozyniak , who has been appointed VP at SEMX's Retconn Inc. subsidiary. Most recently, Sages was CFO and executive VP at Titan Sports.
CTS Corp. has appointed Philip L. Jackson VP and GM of its electrocomponents manufacturing business and Kory B. Stone sales manager for its crystal, clock oscillator and precision oscillator product lines. Formerly, Jackson was VP and GM at Landis & Gyr Utility Services Inc. and Stone was a sales manager at Reeves-Hoffman.
Rod Morison has been named VP and GM of the Tanner EDA Division of Tanner Research Inc. Morison has more than 13 years of semiconductor industry experience in parallel computer microprocessor architectures and design automation tools.
ITT Cannon has appointed Mark Steele GM of ITT Cannon Hong Kong. Most recently, Steele was director of marketing and business development for the company in Japan.
Gabriel Electronics Inc. has promoted David Hatch to the North American sales manager position. Prior to this appointment, Hatch was sales support manager.
Richardson Electronics Ltd.'s Solid State & Components Strategic Business Unit has announced several personnel appointments, including Randy Gonski as regional sales manager, and Lisa Love and Jeff Pitts as field sales engineers. Formerly, Gonski held product marketing and applications engineering positions with Siemens Components, Microwave Semiconductor Corp. and SGS-Thomson Microelectronics; Love worked for an industrial manufacturer; and Pitts was engineering manager at K&L Microwave. In addition, the company has named John Ridder product manager at its RF Power Business Unit. Previously, Ridder held sales and marketing positions at Fujitsu and WES Tech.
Frank E. Emery has been appointed VP, corporate planning and communications at Watkins-Johnson Co. Previously, Emery managed the company's planning and external relations.
Richard J. Ludlow and Ian Stone have been hired to provide international sales and service support to Microwave Instrumentation Technologies LLC. Previously, Ludlow was involved in creating a sales and service subsidiary within Europe for Datatape Inc., and Stone was product support manager for Scientific-Atlanta's Subscriber Products business.
Steven J. Johnson has been appointed director of telecommunications systems at Sanders, a Lockheed Martin company. Most recently, Johnson was acting director of telecommunications systems. In addition, Sanders has named Claude E. Messamore, Jr. director of contracts. Previously, Messamore managed the company's Global Combat Support System Program office.
Gary Pendola has been named inside sales manager for the Long Island division of Semi Dice Inc. Prior to joining the company, Pendola was a test engineer at Modular Devices Inc.
Lisa Grodin has joined Broadband Communications Products Inc. as marketing communications specialist. Grodin has previous marketing and sales experience in the advertising and pharmaceutical fields.
REP APPOINTMENTS
ANADIGICS Inc. , Warren, NJ, has appointed six new sales representatives to market its products for use in wireless, fiber-optic, and cable and broadcast applications. Denmark-based More Electronics , Italy-based Medeos , France-based Tech-Inter and Israel-based Impact Electronics will market the company's complete product lines; and German companies ERM Mikrowellentechnik and AMS will represent ANADIGICS' wireless/cable television and fiber product lines, respectively.
Boonton Electronics Corp. , Parsippany, NJ, has named Testech , Richardson, TX, to represent its full line of RF peak power meters, peak power analyzers, RF voltmeters and other instruments in Texas.
Gabriel Electronics Inc. , Scarborough, ME, has appointed Canadian company CommServe Marketing Inc. to represent its line of products, including antennas, coaxial cable, elliptical waveguide, rigid waveguide components and related accessories, in Canada.
M-tron Industries Inc. , Yankton, SD, has appointed Ross Marketing Associates to represent its line of crystals, oscillators and frequency control devices in northern California and northern Nevada.
NEW MARKET ENTRY
Paratek is a new company developed by former Army Research Laboratory employees to design components for low cost, electronically scanning antennas. A new product, marketed under the trade name Parascan, reportedly reduces the weight, size and cost of currently available antennas. The company is located at the Higher Education and Applied Technology (HEAT) Center outside Aberdeen, MD. For more information, contact Warren Hartenstine, HEAT director of technology advancement and development (410) 638-2515.
WEB SITES
In conjuction with TechOnLine Inc., Analog Devices Inc. , (ADI) Norwood, MA, has developed a new Internet-based training course for its ADI VisualDSP" DSP development environment. "Getting Started with VisualDSP" (http://www.analog.com/dsp) is the first of several ADI self-paced courses planned for this year, and also will be available through TechOnLine University at http://www.techonline.com.
Ecliptek Corp. , Costa Mesa, CA, has redesigned its interactive Web site for quartz crystals and clock oscillators to include an expanded technical application notes section, a virtual factory tour and an easier-to-use part number generation guide. The site, located at http://www.ecliptek.com, also contains a price and delivery request form, a representative and distributor locator, and corporate information.
Environmental Stress Systems Inc. has recently revised and expanded its Web site at http://www.essproducts.com to include a news feature that announces all new designs and products as they become available. All products featured include detailed specifications, photographs and technical descriptions.
Litton Solid State , Santa Clara, CA, has updated its Web site at http://www.littonsolidstate.com to include catalogs and application notes that cover the complete spectrum of wireless solutions. Products detailed include pseudomorphic high electron mobility transistor FETs and MMICs, mm-wave InP Gunn diodes, yttrium iron garnet filters and oscillators, satellite communications converters, amplifiers, linearizers, space-qualified semiconductors and components, and mm-wave transceivers for short-haul radios.