Successful courtship: Adlershof companies with new partners
Not all marriages are made in heaven, some are made in technology parks. The location has witnessed no fewer than three of them involving Adlershof photonics companies: the Bruker Corporation and Veeco; First Sensor Technology and Silicon Sensor; and FISBA OPTIK and TRIOPTICS.
Bruker Nano GmbH hopes to unlock additional potential for growth in the field of nanoanalytics following the take-over in October of the business units Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) and Optical Industrial Metrology (OIM) from the US company Veeco Instruments, Inc. by its parent group, the Bruker Corporation. The transaction was made up of production locations in Santa Barbara, California, and Tucson, Arizona and the global AFM/OIM sales and support organisation. These units now form the new Bruker Nano Surfaces Division. “This takeover will make Bruker not only the market leader in the field of AFM, but also the leading provider of analytical equipment and solutions for material research and nanotechnology,” explained Gert Kommichau, Sales and Marketing Manager at Bruker Nano, represented in Adlershof by 113 of its over 150 employees worldwide. “The new device lines complement our range of equipment for X ray, substance and structural analysis in the micro- and nanometre ranges. The potentials for synergy will provide our business a fresh boost to growth.”
Growth is also the objective of First Sensor Technology GmbH. Since March the company has been part of Silicon Sensor International AG and is to support the refinement of strategy for the sensor line. After all, the technologies First Sensor employs to manufacture MEMS sensors (microelectromechanical systems) rank among the most important sunrise technologies for sensor production. With this purchase, Silicon Sensor intends above all to strengthen the group’s value chain, expand the portfolio and safeguard the “No less important to us was also the influx of know-how, patents, customers and good personnel,” remarked Dr Hans-Georg Giering, Chair of Silicon Sensor, when asked about the company’s takeover that returned a four million Euro turnover in 2009 with thirty five employees. For the time being, though, First Sensor Technology will remain its own company.
On the other hand, the Adlershof company Fisba Optik has new doorplates. Since the end of June 2010, the subsidiary of the Swiss company Fisba Optik AG has been part of Trioptics GmbH based in Wedel near Hamburg. The takeover included not only all employees, but also the product line of measurement technology with the compact μPhase interferometers. At this Adlershof branch, the work in future will be dealing with more than just interferometry: “We intend to set up a broader basis in the field of optical measuring technologies,” explained Managing Director Ricarda Kafka. The medium term could therefore see new jobs come to the Berlin location. Nevertheless, Fisba is again planning for Adlershof. Although nothing specific could be learned in St. Gallen, Switzerland, Marketing Director Barbara Ras let drop that “something was in the making”.
by Petra Hannen
Links:
www.bruker-nano.de
www.first-sensor.com
www.trioptics-berlin.de