Daily News Briefs

Riber SA announced it will combine its two production facilities, in Rueil-Malmaison, France, into a nearby site it is in the process of purchasing. Riber makes molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) machines used in the manufacture of compound semiconductor materials for applications including wireless telecommunications, fiber optic networks and consumer products. . . . The Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), US Congressman Lamar Smith of Texas, Professor Robert Dutton of Stanford University and Professor Mark Lundstrom of Purdue University were honored by the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) this month. The USTR received the SIA 2005 Administration Leadership Award for its work in resolving two trade disputes with China. Smith received the 2005 SIA Congressional Leadership Award for his effective work on issues of importance to the semiconductor industry, including the workforce, intellectual property protection, education, funding for basic research, employee stock options and broadband deployment. Dutton and Lundstrom were recipients of the 2005 SIA University Researcher Awards. . . . Veeco Instruments Inc. has named Richard Wissenbach as senior vice president, general manager, of its compound semiconductor/epitaxial process equipment group. The group includes Veeco's TurboDisc metal organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) operation in Somerset, N.J., and its MBE operations in St. Paul, Minn. MOCVD and MBE are used in epitaxial deposition to determine the brightness and frequency of a compound semiconductor device. Wissenbach was formerly vice president, general manager, for the E-Beam Defect Review Division at KLA-Tencor, in San Jose, Calif., and was previously vice president, Motion Group/PacSci, at Danaher Corp., in Wilmington, Mass. Veeco, based in Woodbury, N.Y., develops products for nanoscale applications in the semiconductor, data storage, compound semiconductor/wireless and scientific research markets.