AVON, Conn., Sept. 6 -- Citing the ever growing international demand for specialty fiber, Lucent Technologies said it would invest new resources and more than $100 million to bolster its specialty fiber optics manufacturing operations in the US and Denmark.
Lucent will invest $9 million to expand its existing facilities in Avon, Conn., and Somerset, N.J., in addition to the recently announced $110 million expansion at its Brondby, Denmark, fiber optic manufacturing facility. The expansions will create about 200 new jobs in the US, as well as 250 new employees in Denmark, of whom about half will be hired to manufacture specialty fiber, Lucent said.
Lucent is widely known for its application fibers such as TrueWave fiber and AllWave fiber, but specialty fiber is one of the fastest growing segments in the industry, said Ken Walker, vice president of Lucent's Specialty Fiber Group. We have dramatically grown this area of our business in the past year and see no signs of slowing demand in the near term.
Lucent's Specialty Fiber Group manufactures short-distance optical fiber, cable and assemblies for telecommunications, medical, and industrial use, as well as erbium-doped fiber, dispersion-compensating modules, optical channel monitors and industrial fiber optic communications systems.