Thursday, May 27, 2010

Rambus Acquires Uni-Pixel Display and Backlighting Intellectual Property

THE WOODLANDS, TX--(Marketwire - May 27, 2010) - Uni-Pixel, Inc. (OTCBB: UNXL), a production stage company delivering its Clearly Superior™ Performance Engineered Films to the lighting and display, solar, and flexible electronics market segments, today announced that Rambus Inc., one of the world's premier technology licensing companies, has acquired a portion of Uni-Pixel's award winning intellectual property (IP) portfolio relating to dynamic backlighting, field sequential color displays, and Time Multiplexed Optical Shutter (TMOS™) display technology. In addition, the Company has entered into an engineering services agreement with Rambus providing the ability for future collaboration and technology development. Rambus will pay Uni-Pixel $2.25 million for these display and backlighting patents.

TMOS display technology can provide LCD panel manufacturers with a better means of building displays by reducing material costs and delivering superior performance. The technology is targeted to leverage a subset of the current LCD manufacturing process, offering the potential of lowering the bill-of-materials and manufacturing costs by as much as 40-60%, while improving display performance characteristics including lower power consumption. Furthermore, backlight technology based on TMOS display technology can be applied to current LCD display panels to create a more efficient and cost-effective device.

Reed Killion, president and CEO of Uni-Pixel, noted, "Rambus has a long and rich history of creating and licensing industry-leading solutions, and we are pleased to enter into this agreement with a company of their caliber and significant expertise. The alignment with Rambus, specifically its Lighting and Display Technology group, leverages strong business and technical synergies around the licensing, development and manufacturing of advanced micro-optics (MicroLens™ technology), edge illumination systems (backlights) and display technologies. Rambus has demonstrated that its extensive system and integration expertise is core to its success in becoming one of the premier licensing companies in the world. We look forward to further leveraging our technological capabilities in support of this agreement."
Mr. Killion continued, "We see this agreement as a win-win for both companies, as it gives Uni-Pixel the ability to focus on our Clearly Superior Performance Engineered Films, while allowing Rambus to add innovative display and backlighting technology to its growing intellectual property portfolio."

"This acquisition recognizes the significant contributions Uni-Pixel's innovative technology can make to our solutions for LCD displays for HDTVs, mobile devices and PCs," said Jeff Parker, senior vice president of the Lighting and Display Technology group at Rambus. "In combination with our design expertise and patented innovations, such as MicroLens optical technology, our goal is to greatly advance the performance and cost-effectiveness of displays incorporating dynamic backlighting, field sequential color, and TMOS technology."

Uni-Pixel's business model is significantly optimized by focusing its efforts on the development and manufacturing of its Clearly Superior Performance Engineered Films for the display and backlighting, general lighting, solar and flexible electronics market sectors. To date, the Company's commercialization approach had centered on licensing the TMOS display and backlight technology to existing panel and backlight manufacturers, while supplying those licensees with its Clearly Superior Performance Engineered Film as one of the subcomponents in those technologies.

About Uni-Pixel, Inc.
Uni-Pixel is a production stage company delivering its Clearly Superior™ Performance Engineered Films to the Lighting & Display, Solar and Flexible Electronics market segments. Uni-Pixel's high-volume roll-to-roll or continuous flow manufacturing process offers high-fidelity replication of advanced micro-optic structures and surface characteristics over large area, combined with a thin film conductive element. The Company plans to sell its films as sub- components for use in LCD, FSC - LCD and its Time Multiplexed Optical Shutter (TMOS) display technology as a back light film and active film sub-component. The Company is currently shipping its Clearly Superior ™ Finger Print Resistant protective cover films for multiple touch enabled devices. In addition, Uni-Pixel sells its films under the Clearly Superior™ brand, as well as private label and OEM. Uni-Pixel was recently recognized by MDB Capital Group as one of the top 50 small-cap most innovative public companies. Uni-Pixel's corporate headquarters are located in The Woodlands, TX. For further information please see www.unipixel.com.

Monday, May 24, 2010

MEMC Announces Agreement to Acquire Solaicx

ST. PETERS, Mo., May 24, 2010 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ --MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc. (NYSE: WFR) today announced it has reached a definitive agreement to acquire privately held Solaicx, headquartered in Santa Clara, California.

Solaicx has developed proprietary continuous crystal growth manufacturing technology which yields low-cost, high-efficiency monocrystalline silicon wafers for the photovoltaic solar industry. The Solaicx technology allows for very high-volume crystal growth compared to the silicon ingots produced in the traditional precision semiconductor manufacturing process. The enhanced electrical performance of wafers from Solaicx ingots allows solar cell manufacturers to create higher efficiency cells with very competitive silicon costs. In addition to these customer benefits, the combined company will have low-cost polysilicon and crystal operations in North America and sales and support offices around the world, allowing the company to provide customers with industry leading customer service.

Solaicx has approximately 80 employees and a large-scale production facility in Portland, Oregon.

"Solaicx, along with its people and technical expertise, is a great addition to MEMC," said Ken Hannah, President of MEMC Solar Materials. "Solaicx's innovative and advanced manufacturing technology should enable us to reduce costs and improve efficiency, while enhancing our ability to drive the solar industry toward grid parity."

"Bringing MEMC and Solaicx together now is the right thing to do at the right time," continued Hannah. "The monocrystalline silicon market is forecast to grow at a compound annual growth rate of about 50 percent during the next three years. This transaction positions MEMC to significantly reduce the cost of monocrystalline silicon."

"We are pleased to be joining forces with MEMC," said David Ranhoff, President and CEO of Solaicx. "Our technology combined with MEMC's footprint and scale will enable our customers to further reduce the cost of solar electricity."

MEMC will pay to the existing securityholders of Solaicx at closing cash in the amount of $66 million, plus an additional amount in cash equal to amounts which have been recently invested in, or which may be invested prior to closing in Solaicx by its existing securityholders. The aggregate additional investment amount is estimated to be approximately $10 million. Solaicx's indebtedness for borrowed money will be extinguished at closing and is included in these amounts. The merger consideration is also subject to adjustment based on the net working capital of Solaicx at closing. The agreement also includes an earnout, should Solaicx meet certain performance targets in 2010 and 2011, of up to an additional $27.6 million payable to Solaicx securityholders, consisting of cash and MEMC common stock at the election of the securityholder. The stock portion of the earnout consideration, if any, will be issued to Solaicx securityholders as a private placement.

The acquisition is expected to close by the end of June 2010, subject to customary closing conditions, including Solaicx shareholder approval, and the receipt of regulatory approvals. MEMC expects the acquisition to be accretive to earnings in 2011, subject to purchase accounting adjustments.

GCA Savvian Advisors, LLC acted as exclusive financial advisor to MEMC in connection with this transaction.

This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of MEMC common stock in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction.

About MEMC

MEMC is a global leader in the manufacture and sale of wafers and related intermediate products to the semiconductor and solar industries. MEMC is also a developer of solar power projects and North America's largest solar energy services provider. MEMC has been a pioneer in the design and development of silicon wafer technologies for 50 years. With R&D and manufacturing facilities in the U.S., Europe and Asia, MEMC enables the next generation of high performance semiconductor devices and solar cells. MEMC's common stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "WFR" and is included in the S&P 500 Index. For more information about MEMC, visit www.memc.com.

About Solaicx, Inc.

Solaicx manufactures low-cost, high-quality silicon ingots using proprietary equipment optimized for the solar industry. Solaicx is "making solar electricity cost effective"(R) by reducing the manufacturing cost of crystalline photovoltaics, which comprise more than 80 percent of all solar cells on the market today. The Solaicx process provides significant competitive advantages in terms of cost, quality and silicon utilization. For more information about Solaicx, visit www.solaicx.com.

Monday, May 17, 2010

Zarlink Sells Optical Products Group to Tyco Electronics

OTTAWA, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - May 17, 2010) - Zarlink Semiconductor (TSX:ZL) today announced that it has sold the assets of its Optical Products group to Tyco Electronics (NYSE: TEL) for approximately US$15 million in cash.

"The sale of our Optical Products group follows our strategy of narrowing our focus to markets where we can maintain a strong leadership position, while improving operational efficiencies to build a more profitable business," said Kirk Mandy, President and CEO, Zarlink Semiconductor. "This transaction enables us to target our sales and product development efforts on network timing, medical wireless and line circuit initiatives to expand our presence in these markets, build deeper customer relationships and address immediate and long-term revenue growth opportunities."

With the sale of its Optical Products group, Zarlink is now focused on its key growth initiatives in the network timing, medical wireless and line circuit markets. These include:
  • Network timing products that help carriers deliver time-sensitive voice, video, data and multimedia traffic over packet networks, including Timing-over-Packet and Synchronous Ethernet solutions for wireless backhaul and new ClockCenter products for optical transport networks (OTN);
  • Medical wireless radio chips and modules enabling high-speed, ultra reliable communication between implanted medical devices, including pacemakers and implantable cardioverter-defibrillators (ICDs), and monitoring and programming equipment;
  • Line circuit technology enabling high-quality telephone service over cable and broadband networks.
Mr. Mandy added: "There is significant customer design activity for our timing products, as carriers undertake a multi-phase network overhaul to better support higher bandwidth communication services, including new smartphone applications. Our timing business is positioned to grow quickly, with strong customer demand for our packet network timing products and new opportunities for timing technologies in optical transport applications. In the medical market, we are uniquely positioned as a provider of standards compliant radios for wirelessly enabled implanted medical devices and enjoy established relationships with the world's largest medical device manufacturers. Finally, our line circuit portfolio is a solid, profitable business that provides the scale necessary to help drive operating efficiencies across the Company."