Business briefs

17 Jun 2002

Including news from Burleigh Instruments, Alcatel and the Laser Institute of America.

RGL Electronics, UK, has set up Eyetec to manufacture infrared presence detectors. The company is now entering a 15 month product development contract with fellow UK firm QinetiQ to bring the technology to market.

Burleigh Instruments, UK, is to change its trading name to Scientifica. The change is due to the increased portfolio of products that the company is now offering UK customers for photonics and life science applications.

Alcatel claims that it has set a new world record for optical transmission over unrepeated submarine distance. This breakthrough was achieved using cascaded Raman amplification that allowed 1.6 Tbit/s to be transmitted over 321 km unrepeated.

The Laser Institute of America has announced the recipients of both its Schawlow award and Presidents award. These awards will be presented during this year's the International Congress on Applications of Lasers and Electro-Optics (ICALEO). Walter Duley, founder of Powerlasers, will be awarded the Schawlow prize for contributions to the laser industry. David Sliney will receive the Presidents award in recognition of contributions made to the laser safety industry.

Northstar Photonics, US, has secured USD 11 million in new financing with St Paul Venture Capital as the lead investor. This will allow Northstar to commercialize its products based on rare-earth doped planar waveguide technologies.

SPD, a subsidiary of Hankuk Glass Industries, is to expand its production and management staff at its new plant in Inchon, Korea. The company manufactures suspended particle device light control film which regulates the amount of light passing through glass or plastic.