Dalsa to buy CCD business from Royal Philips Electronics
Dalsa Corp. (Waterloo, Ont., Canada) will acquire the CCD Image Sensors Business of Royal Philips Electronics (Eindhoven, The Netherlands). This purchase is expected to include intellectual property, technology, assets, product lines, and employees associated with Philips' CCD Image Sensors Business. With about 60 employees, and annual sales of approximately €14 million (US$12.3 million), Philips' CCD business is a fabless designer and manufacturer of high-performance, high-resolution, CCD image-sensor products for professional markets. The transaction is intended to secure the CCD Image Sensors Business' future, to allow its future growth as a part of a more focused activity, and to secure customer relationships. The acquisition would bring the group's semiconductor-wafer production into Dalsa's other recent acquisition—the Bromont, Quebec wafer foundry that Dalsa acquired from Zarlink (formerly Mitel; Ottawa, Ont., Canada) in February of this year.
Indigo Systems teams with Autoliv
Indigo Systems (Santa Barbara, CA), a manufacturer of infrared cameras and telecommunications devices, has formed a strategic partnership with Autoliv (Stockholm, Sweden), a provider of automotive safety systems. Their alliance is designed to focus on developing affordable infrared devices for use in automobiles and other vehicles and extending a driver's night-vision capability up to three times past where conventional high-beams allow them to see. Using technology developed in conjunction with the U.S. Army, the cameras detect heat from objects and are calibrated to be sensitive to the emission wavelengths of humans and animals.
PFE gets $4.3 million in third-round funding
Printable Field Emitters (PFE; Didcot, England) has secured US$4.3 million in third-round funding from a consortium that includes NIF Ventures (Tokyo, Japan) and 3i and Quester (both of London, England). The money will be used to complete the development of a 14-in. diagonal piece of a 40-in. full-color field-emission display (FED) with high brightness, uniformity, and color purity that uses low-cost screen-printing of the cold cathode and other components. The 14-in. section is expected to demonstrate the potential of PFE's technology, which the company plans to introduce into consumer-priced 20- to 40-in. flat-panel television displays by the end of 2002. Printable Field Emitters was founded in 1995 to develop and commercialize FED technology originally developed at Aston University (Birmingham, England) for large (greater than 20-in. diagonal) television and computer applications.
DuPont boosts manufacturing of display materials
DuPont Microcircuit Materials (MCM; Wilmington, DE) has announced plans to expand manufacturing facilities at its Manati, Puerto Rico, site for production of photoprintable composition materials used in the plasma display-panel market. Concurrently, DuPont is launching a new generation of products to meet the needs for finer line resolution and lower panel-manufacturing costs. The investment in additional production capacity will triple current capacity for these materials. The increased production is expected to be complete in the first quarter of 2002. The expansion will enable the company to meet a projected 40% to 50% annual growth of its customers in the plasma display-panel market for the next three years, according to MCM president Hal Snyder.
PerkinElmer sheds businesses
PerkinElmer (Boston, MA) is selling its Detection Systems business to L-3 Communications (New York, NY) for approximately $100 million. Detection Systems is a leading supplier of x-ray inspection systems and is expected to generate revenues of more than $80 million in 2001. The sale is expected to close in the first quarter of 2002. The deal is intended to help PerkinElmer continue expanding its three core businesses: life sciences, optoelectronics, and analytical instruments. PerkinElmer also sold two nonstrategic product lines for $85 million. The company sold Instruments for Research and Applied Science (IRAS) to Ametek (Paoli, PA) and Voltarc Technologies to Innovative Technologies Group (Foothill Ranch, CA). Products by IRAS—which sold for $63 million—include high-purity germanium detectors and spectrometers.
Also in the news . . .
Zight Corp. (Boulder, CO; formerly Colorado Microdisplay) is shutting down. . . . IBM Corp. (Armonk, NY) led the U.S. patent list for the ninth consecutive year, with 3411 patents on displays and other devices issued to the company in 2001. . . . Microvision Inc. (Bothell, WA) has begun shipping its see-through head-worn microdisplay; uses for the device will include low-vision correction and surgical workstations.