Agilent Technologies Opens Optics Shop to External Customers

Caren B. Les

In response to customer requests, Agilent Technologies Inc. of Palo Alto, Calif., has opened its precision optics and design capabilities to outside customers. The custom capabilities have been developed in-house for almost 40 years to support the company’s laser interferometry business and a limited number of customers.

After opening the shop to selected new customers, it was determined that broadening the business in this way drove a significant increase in optics orders, according to Vince Barich, operations manager of Agilent’s Precision Optical and Assemblies group in Santa Clara, Calif. The gains allowed the company to add engineers and to expose it to new applications, he added.

The group’s core products include monolithic multiaxis interferometers; auto-aligned, drop-in optical assemblies; alignment and beam steering optics; and fiber delivery and fiber output optomechanical assemblies. Its expertise in measurement science enables the delivery of components to specification with the metrology to verify its performance. With its focus on technology for repeatable production processes, Agilent offers volume production of the components and assemblies.

Precision optics are required in the products and systems of a variety of industries, including the field of nanotechnology. They have applications in such areas as lasers, lithography, scientific and medical instrumentation, and optical fabrication and in test-and-measurement equipment.