Daily News Briefs

Alcatel and Finmeccanica have launched two new joint ventures, Alcatel Alenia Space and Telespazio Holding. Alcatel Alenia Space combines the activities of Alcatel Space and will manufacture space systems, satellites, payloads, orbital infrastructures and space transportation instruments and associated ground systems for civilian and military applications. It is based in Cannes, France, with plants in France, Italy, Belgium and Spain. Telespazio Holding combines Telespazio with Alcatel Space Services and Operations; it concentrates on operations and services for satellite and space systems, including networking, multimedia and earth observation. It is located in Rome, with plants in Italy, France and Germany. Giorgio Zappa, COO of Finmeccanica, is now chairman of the supervisory board of Alcatel Alenia Space, and Pascale Sourisse is president and CEO of the new company. Olivier Houssin, executive vice president of Alcatel and president of its Private Communications Group, which handles Alcatel's space activities, was named chairman of the board of directors of Telespazio Holding, and Giuseppe Veredice is now its CEO. . . . Intel Corp. and Corning Inc. have announced a joint program to develop ULE (ultralow thermal expansion) glass photomask substrates needed to make low-defect EUV photomasks that will enable 32-nm node high-volume production using extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography. The companies said the effort will help to enable chip production using EUV technology starting in 2009. Lithography tools are used in chip making to "print" patterns on a silicon wafer. Today, the industry uses lithography tools that use a 193-nm wavelength of light to "print" transistors as small as 50 nm -- equivalent to a painter trying to draw very fine lines using a thick brush. EUV lithography technology will use light that is only 13.5-nm wavelengths of light, so it can provide chip makers with a very "fine brush" to "draw" smaller transistors in the future. . . . Riber, a French maker of molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) machines, has received an order for a Compact21T research machine for delivery in Europe this year. This is Riber's seventh MBE machine order in 2005. MBE systems enable the manufacture of compound semiconductor materials, which are used in applications such as wireless telecommunications, fiber optic networks and consumer products.