Industry News

NATEL Engineering Inc. announced that it has acquired the assets of Scrantom Engineering Inc., Costa Mesa, CA, a Solectron company. The new company, now known as Scrantom Inc., a NATEL company, will become an integral part of NATEL's broad capabilities in microelectronic packaging. Scrantom Inc. will continue to operate out of its Costa Mesa facility.


Maury Microwave Corp. announced that it has signed an agreement with Modelithics Inc., Tampa, FL, to advance the application of load/source pull measurement for more efficient nonlinear device modeling and circuit design. Under the agreement, applications of load/source pull measurements will be advanced using the latest Maury Microwave Automated Tuner Systems. These test systems will allow Modelithics to create a wider variety of high accuracy nonlinear device models and load-pull data sets to accelerate RF and microwave designs.

LPKF Laser and Electronics AG, Garbsen, Germany, has announced that the company has signed a corporation agreement with Harting Technology Group, Espelkamp, Germany. This partnership allows Harting to produce three-dimensional molded interconnect devices (3D-MID) for the micro packaging field, using LPKF's proprietary laser direct structuring process. With this agreement, Harting will become a full-featured supplier of LDS made 3D-MID solutions.

OMMIC and Alcatel have announced that both parties are collaborating on the transfer of Alcatel's advanced indium phosphide heterojunction bipolar transistor technology to OMMIC's industrial clean rooms at its center in Limeil-Brévannes, France. This transfer will complete OMMIC's commercial portfolio of III-V technologies and will provide Alcatel's system designers with a qualified source to develop 40 Gbit/s transmission systems for core networks. The move is aimed at taking advantage of the increasing interest in InP, for its potential in microelectronic applications, ranging from millimeter-wave space and terrestrial communication systems, to high bit rate fiber transmission systems.

SSB Technologies Inc. announced that it has reincorporated under the Stealth Microwave trademark name. Stealth Microwave Inc. is an ISO 9001:2000 certified company that provides ultra-linear single and multi-carrier RF and microwave amplifiers to wireless and military markets. The new Web site is www. stealthmicrowave.com. The company can be contacted at (888) 772-7791, (609) 538-8586, fax: (609) 538-8587, or e-mail: sales@ssbtech.com.

Elcoteq Network Corp. has moved its Americas headquarters to a new facility in Irving, TX. Growth in sales and services and an increase in personnel necessitated more space. The new offices are 60 percent larger than the previous ones and contain the executive staff, administration, IT, marketing, sales, human resources and supply chain management. Elcoteq Americas includes manufacturing and NPI facilities in Monterrey, Mexico and Dallas, TX, and employs 1050 people. The new address is 909 Lake Carolyn Parkway, Suite 500, Irving, TX 75039. The phone and fax numbers will remain unchanged at (972) 401-9995 and fax: (972) 401-9606.

Park/Nelco California has moved its office. The company's new contact information is 1100 E. Kimberly Avenue, Anaheim, CA 92801 (714) 459-4400 and fax: (714) 459-4492.

Knowledge*ON Semiconductor has had its high linearity heterojunction bipolar transistor process qualified by several major Japanese customers. Continuous feedback from these customers has highlighted a high wafer yield, typically over 95 percent. The companies have been able to utilize the HL process that Knowledge*ON Semiconductor's foundry offers. It is suitable for WLAN power amplifier MMIC applications and the InGaP HBT meets the tight specifications of power amplifiers for 802.11a. This includes linearity (EVM), high gain and low power consumption in the 5 GHz frequency range.

RF Micro Devices Inc. announced that its facility in Beijing, China, has received ISO 14001:1996 certification for environmental management systems by the TUV Management Service certification body. Certification was granted upon independent verification of the Beijing facility's compliance with the standard.

Vectron International has been presented the "Partners in Performance" award by Celestica for outstanding efforts and support of Celestica's needs for 2002. Since its inception, the "Partners in Performance" award has recognized suppliers who, through a combination of business and technology excellence, have made a major contribution to Celestica's growth. The award was presented to Vectron in a ceremony that took place in Celestica's Toronto facility.

Storm Products' Microwave Business Unit received the Navy's Integrated Warfare Systems Award for Excellence in a ceremony held at Storm's Woodridge, IL, location. The award honors outstanding contractor performance. Storm-Microwave is a single source supplier for low loss hard line cable assemblies used in the phased-array radar weapon system developed by Lockheed Martin for the Navy's Aegis fleet. Representatives of the Navy, Lockheed Martin, and state and local government attended the ceremony, at which Storm was presented with a citation and the PEO-IWS Flag of Excellence.

Contract

MI Technologies has received a contract from ETS-Lindgren of Cedar Park, TX, to supply antenna test and measurement equipment for three test chambers that will be part of a new 220,000 square-foot engineering design and development facility operated by BAE Systems Avionics Ltd. near the Luton, UK airport. Under terms of the contract, MI Technologies will supply an equipment package that includes electro-mechanical antenna positioners and precision motion control instrumentation. MI Technologies will also provide system integration services to enable third-party test instrumentation in the chambers to operate successfully with MI Technologies' MI-3000 Version 3.0 workstation and software. The project, which began in October, is scheduled to be completed within six months to correspond with BAE Systems' anticipated launch of the new Capability Green test facility in Luton.

Financial News

Ansoft Corp. reports sales of $12.3 M for the second quarter of fiscal 2004 ended October 31, 2003, compared to $10.6 M for the same period in 2003. Net loss was $22,000 (essentially break even per diluted share), compared to a net loss of $2.2 M ($0.19/per diluted share) for the second quarter of last year.

Mimix Broadband Inc. announced that it has secured additional investments in its second round of institutional financing, closing the round with a total of $8 M. Investments from Gefinor Ventures as well as individual investors completed this second round. In related news, Greg Carlisle, managing director of Gefinor Ventures, will join the company's board of directors. Carlisle has over 20 years of experience in software development, high technology company start-ups and venture capital investing.

Merrimac Industries Inc. reports sales of $6.4 M for the third quarter of 2003 ended September 27, 2003, compared to $5.9 M for the same period in 2002. Net loss was $484,000 ($0.16/per share), compared to a net income of $57,000 ($0.02/per share) for the third quarter of last year. In related news, Merrimac announced that it has received an order for Multi-Mix PICO™ products from a large wireless base station provider. This order is expected to generate revenues of $450,000.

Andrew Corp. announced that it has made an investment in Andes Industries Inc. and its principal operating subsidiary, PCT International, a supplier of optical and RF equipment for the broadband cable market. The financial terms of the investment are not being disclosed. For broadband cable TV operators, this means that Andrew and PCT International can now combine efforts to provide: one-stop sourcing of cable, connectors, multimedia taps, digital splitters, amplifiers and optical equipment; innovative fiber-to-the-business and fiber-to-the-home solutions; extended sales coverage and round-the-clock customer service and support; and an integrated global manufacturing and distribution network to speed delivery.

Personnel

W. Cleon Anderson, chief project engineer at L-3 Communication Systems-West, Salt Lake City, UT, has been elected as IEEE president elect for 2004. Anderson will succeed Arthur W. Winston as IEEE president on January 1, 2005. In this capacity, he serves as a member of the IEEE board of directors and executive committee. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics
Engineers is a technical professional society, with more than 360,000 members in over 150 countries. Previously, Anderson held many leadership positions in the IEEE, most recently serving on the IEEE board as vice president of regional activities in 2003.

Thunderline-Z, an Emerson company, has announced that Debra Breed, formerly sales and marketing manager at the company, has taken over general management responsibilities from Bill Fierle, who has been promoted. As managing director, Breed will be focusing her attention on key sales and operations initiatives. In her previous position as sales and marketing manager, Breed reorganized and rejuvenated the field sales force, streamlined sales order processing, and helped to plan and implement an advertising strategy that focuses on growth and future markets.

Rep Appointments

Barry Industries announced new rep appointments, in Texas, Cross Plains Technology, who can be contacted at (972) 727-3128, and in the UK, Melcom Ltd., who can be contacted at 01932 565544.

Hittite Microwave Corp. announced the appointment of a new sales representative firm to serve customers in northern Germany. MRC Components OHG, Freising, Germany, was established in 1997 to act as a specialist European representative for electronic component manufacturers from the US and Far East. MRC will supplement Hittite's direct sales channel by focusing efforts on customers located in northern Germany. Hittite Microwave Deutschland GmbH will focus on servicing customers in southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

RF Logic LLC announced the appointment of TE Repco as the company's exclusive representative in the Florida territory. The company has also appointed MHNI Inc., Aptos, CA, as its exclusive authorized national distributor for all LOGICFLEX test cables. MHNI can be reached at (831) 688-0588 or via its Web site, http://www.mhnidistribution.com/.