Microsemi Corporation announced the company’s 60th anniversary of its products being used in space missions and its legacy of leadership in developing innovative solutions for the thriving space market. After first providing a micro-positioner relay for the Atlas rocket launch in 1957, Microsemi has since developed an extensive space product portfolio enabling enhanced performance for demanding customer needs and built a long, successful heritage of supporting space missions with a variety of high reliability solutions. As part of this milestone, the company is leveraging its unique legacy into a series of Space Forums, taking place in North America, Europe and India in May, June and July.
Microsemi also announced it has shipped six million JANS-qualified diode and transistor discrete devices in the past 10 years, adding to the tens of millions it has shipped since it began supplying JANS-qualified devices in 1983. With a broad and expanding range of specialized radiation-hardened and radiation-tolerant products suitable for space-flight applications including satellites, launch vehicles and landers, Microsemi continues to be the top semiconductor supplier to the defense and aerospace market according to market research firm Databeans. In addition, the company is currently providing over 75 percent of the slash sheets on the Military Performance Specification (MIL-PRF-19500) and qualified manufacturers list (QML-19500).
“Microsemi’s deep experience in the space market is invaluable when it comes to serving the demanding needs of space customers, as our expertise truly differentiates us in this market,” said James J. Peterson, chairman and CEO of Microsemi. “Our 60-year legacy as a dependable, innovative developer of solutions which meet the challenging needs of space customers has allowed us to help them evolve over the past 60 years, and we stand firmly committed to innovate and lead this market for decades to come.”
Following the company’s entry into the space market in 1957 to enable the Atlas rocket launch, Microsemi’s space technology was subsequently deployed in a variety of space missions in the 1950s and 1960s, as well as in the Surveyor, Apollo and Saturn programs of the late 1960s and 1970s. In the late 1970s the company engaged with NASA on the Voyager Program and after 37 years Microsemi’s relays continue to operate reliably in space. The company’s relays, field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), mixed signal integrated circuits (ICs) and discrete semiconductors have also supported U.S. and international space programs initiated since the 1990s, including the Mars Explorer Rovers, Mars Science Lab and Cygnus spacecraft initiatives of the 2000s and 2010s.
As part of its 60-year celebration, Microsemi will host a series of Space Forums where company leaders and other experts will share their experience in addressing the unique needs of the space market. Speakers will present the most advanced space-related products, capabilities and technology roadmaps, as well as solutions for combatting the effects of radiation and other challenges.
“These must-attend Space Forums reinforce our commitment to the space industry by providing an ideal platform to showcase the latest technology innovations from Microsemi and other industry leaders, as well as detailed updates on the qualification and radiation characterization of a wide variety of solutions,” said Ken O’Neill, director of high reliability product marketing at Microsemi. “As a leading supplier of microelectronics and semiconductors to the space market, we are pleased to offer these popular events in multiple regions as demand for our space expertise continues to strengthen.”
Microsemi’s Space Forums, a biannual series of events, will be held online May 18 for North America attendees, with an in-person event planned in Europe on June 20 at the Radisson Blu Palace Hotel in Noordwijk, Netherlands and two in-person events planned in India on July 25 at The Leela Palace in Bangalore and July 27 at the Courtyard Marriott in Ahmedabad. The events bring together Microsemi, members of the company’s growing space ecosystem and global space customers to focus on important topics relevant to the space market, including product updates, roadmaps and demonstrations on discrete semiconductors, mixed signal ICs, FPGAs and complementary products, tools and services. For more information, visit https://www.microsemi.com/spaceforum/space-forum.