JENA, Germany, April 5, 2005 -- Photonics components maker Jenoptik AG of Jena, Germany, announced it has started a new joint venture with a Chinese partner, Hommelwerke GmbH, a specialist in high-precision contact and noncontact optical measurement technology within the Jenoptik Group. The new company, Hommel Telstar Co. Ltd., has registered offices in Shanghai. "The growth by Asian automobile manufacturers has led to a strong growth in production measurement technology sales in this region," Jenoptik said in a statement. It said the main goal of Hommel Telstar is to expand Jenoptik's service and distribution network in Asia. It will also manufacture small devices for regional Chinese markets. The company has 18 employees with sales offices in Beijing and Qhongqing. In addition to Hommelwerke GmbH, which holds 50 percent of the new company, the local management of Telstar-Hommel Corp., founded last year in South Korea, has a stake in Hommel Telstar, Jenoptik said. Hommelwerke, through Telstar-Hommel, a production measuring technology provider for the automobile and mechanical engineering industries, has been active in the South Korean market since 2004 and has had a presence in those markets for 20 years, initially through trade representatives, then through its own sales offices, Jenoptik said. Hommelwerke also has investment holdings and subsidiaries in the USA, France and the Czech Republic. Hommelwerke specializes in high-precision, noncontact optical measuring technology and contact measuring technology for dimensional analysis and the analysis of shapes, contours and surface properties. Its customers include car manufacturers and automotive industry suppliers. The company, based in Villingen-Schwenningen and Jena, Germany, was founded in 1876. It has been a subsidiary of Jenoptik Laser, Optik, Systeme GmbH, part of Jenoptik's photonics business division, since May 2000. Jenoptik also announced that Birgit Diezel, finance minister of the Free State of Thuringia, Germany, will resign from its supervisory board. The move is intended to avoid conflicts with stock exchange rules involving the intended sale of the state's planned shareholding in Jenoptik, according to a Thuringian Ministry of Finance press release. For more information, visit: www.hommelwerke.com