Company News
Staff -- Semiconductor International, 2/1/2003
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Numerical Technologies Inc. (San Jose) has made several announcements recently, the most significant being its acquisition by Synopsys Inc. (Mountain View, Calif.). A definitive agreement calls for Synopsys to acquire all outstanding shares of Numerical's common stock for a cash purchase price of $7 per share. At press time, however, Numerical shareholders had filed a class-action lawsuit against the company and its board of directors, alleging that Numerical's directors breached their fiduciary duties by approving the terms of the proposed acquisition of the company's stock. The suit seeks an injunction preventing the closing of the acquisition, along with other injunctive relief.
Other recent news from Numerical involves renewed licensing agreements with Taiwanese foundry UMC, and Motorola Inc.'s Semiconductor Products Sector; and new agreements with Chinese foundry SMIC, Korea's Samsung Electronics, and two top photomask manufacturers. - Micronic Laser Systems AB (Täby, Sweden) announced a couple new orders recently for its laser pattern generators, including one from a maskmaker in China for an MP80+, and one from a Japanese maskmaker for an Omega6000 series system.
- Cymer Inc. (San Diego) has announced that Charles J. (Jay) Abbe has joined the company's board of directors, replacing Kenneth M. Deemer, who retired from the board. Abbe previously served as president, CEO and a director of JDS Uniphase Corp., and as president and CEO of Optical Coating Laboratory Inc. (OCLI).
- Shipley Co. (Marlborough, Mass.) signed a joint development agreement with Therma-Wave Inc. (Fremont, Calif.). The companies plan to develop scatterometric methods to better measure 130 nm photoresist features for polysilicon gate and shallow trench applications.
- Corning Inc. (Corning, N.Y.) announced that its Canton, N.Y., facility has reached full production of CaF2 crystals to support 193 nm lithography. After expanding to this facility, the company began CaF2 crystal production with its news furnaces in September 2002. The company also produces CaF2 crystals in North Brookfield, Mass.
- Nikon Corp. (Tokyo) has joined the X Initiative, a semiconductor supply-chain consortium geared to validate a chip architecture based on diagonal chip wiring. Nikon used its NSR-S205C 248 nm lithography tool to process X Architecture wafers.
