Daily News Briefs

Spectra-Physics, founded in 1961, celebrates their 40th anniversary this year. Spectra-Physics now has annual sales of approximately $200 million, and is growing rapidly. CEO Pat Edsell believes that this century will be the photonics century - revolutionizing the way we live.

State-of-the-art technology for the manufacture of high-brightness inorganic blue/green light-emitting diodes (LEDs) will be developed by researchers at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) to help the local optoelectronics industry in a fast-growing world market. The project has been awarded HK$ 15 million by the Innovation and Technology Fund with a matching sponsorship by three local LED companies.