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Editorial — UK Electronics from bad to worse?
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EDITORIAL
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UK E l e c t r o n i c s Going From Bad To Worse? Just a week ago, with the Plessey takeover having reached some kind of conclusion it seemed that the UK electronics industry could at last get back to work. Takeovers absorb so much effort that it's a good ploy to threaten a competitor with a few judicious rumours if you want them out of the frame for a while. So with one of the longest and least pleasant takeovers now signed and sealed - one which precipitated the demise of the UICs only true chance of commercial GaAs ICs - we might have expected some kind of quiet to have descended. Not so.
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lmOst within days e more gloomy s; when people said Plessey was goingunder they often said at least we've still got Ferranti, but now that company's future looks grave. It would seem that UK Electronics is going the way of UK aviation in the Sixties. Lets of fine names have vanished from the scene over the last few decades as one by one they have fallento takeovers. Ironically, should Ferranti go the way of Plessey it will be one of its own takeovers which put it on the spot. Its problem being a misconceception as to the real worth ofISC, aided by the US paranoia for secrecy and some creative accounting. Now Ferranti is seeking financial assistance (read takeover?) to rescue it. It couldn't have come at a better time for the other consortia bidding for the Eurofighter radar contract. Ferranti's ECR90 had almost clinched it against the MSD-2000 proposal from AEG. The latter (favoured by the West Germans) would compromise the export prospects of the Eurofighter, however, due to its Hughes origins. US secrecy is again the source of the problem. There are also the INS, FLIR and other projects which Ferranti would like a share of, to see the company into the next century. Ironically, its salvation may lie with a merger with BAe with whom it is competing for the INS. Then the UK would have two giant companies, the other being GEC, competing for defence contracts, the MoD would get it's competitive bidding and the UK would not lose yet another company to foreign control. Upheavals in the UK defence electronics business reflect the US Experience. As Jo Ann has pointed out in
this and previous issues, electronics must realign itself away from defence. The apparent easing of tensions between East and West is one of the major reasons but the golden era of large cash hand-outs on lucrative defence contracts has long been fading away anyway. Leaving consumer electronics to the Far East and retreating to telecomms and defence was just statlingthe inevitable. The rest of the year will see very interesting times for the UK electronics industry. Just which parts of Plessey will go to GEC and which parts to Siemens? The carveup should lead to some interesting squabbling behind the scenes and perhaps in public. Already the 3-5 staffthat remain have seen the Opto management carry off their successful buy-out while Signal Technology, the SAW group, just missed theirs, some staffhave gone to boost competitors' efforts and others have been carried off to CasweU to an uncertain future. They must be sitting there wondering how it all came to happen and the reality must be difficult to accept: being taken over by a part-German bid on the 50th Anniversary of WW2. While the Americans are watching as the Japanese companies buy them up, Britainis being sold off to the Germans. Its all just down to business, its open warfare out there and if you can't hack it then sooner or later you get what you deserve. It couldbe that Lord Weinstock is right, however, in saying we should no longer be thinldng of UK electronics, but of European Electronics. New mass market systems such as fibre/optoelectrenics, DBS, mobile phones and HDTVwill be big opportunities for those with the size and the manage-
ment with the guts to make the right decisions. A joint Siemens-GEC-Plessey organisation is perhaps the way to retain an indigenous European electronics industry. Perhaps III-Vs: GaAs ICs and OE, might flourish in the hands of Kaske and Weinstock? Time will tell...this might be our last chance for a place in the 21st Century. In this issue we have a controversy too. In our GaAs IC Symposium issue we have a '~Fechnology Comparison of GaAs & Si" from Plessey's Peter Saul. In the haven of GaAs ICs nary a pair of silicon engineers will be found, which is a shame. We should encourage a mixing of disciplines because each can learn from the other. IC Processing is the central theme of the issue and we have articles which take us through the process with aspects of analog, digital and opto. Sumitomo's article is a glimpse of future long ingots essential for mass production of GaAs ICs. Karl Snss is working on X-ray lithography which may be a key to high throughput of the finest geometries. Plasmatech examines the advances in RIE ofopto devices which will be important for integration ofthese devices. We have another article from CvaAsCODE to help sort out your MMIC fab problems. As far as overviews of the US processing perspective go we have three ofthe best: Anadigics, GigaBit and TriQuint relate their experiences and prospects. Have a good GaAs IC Symposium and sign up for the next issue which has the special theme of materials for III-Vs processing;, everything from precursors to packaging. Roy Szweda V2NV Euro III-Vs Review
EDITORIAL
•
UK E l e c t r o n i c s Going From Bad To Worse? Just a week ago, with the Plessey takeover having reached some kind of conclusion it seemed that the UK electronics industry could at last get back to work. Takeovers absorb so much effort that it's a good ploy to threaten a competitor with a few judicious rumours if you want them out of the frame for a while. So with one of the longest and least pleasant takeovers now signed and sealed - one which precipitated the demise of the UICs only true chance of commercial GaAs ICs - we might have expected some kind of quiet to have descended. Not so.
4
lmOst within days e more gloomy s; when people said Plessey was goingunder they often said at least we've still got Ferranti, but now that company's future looks grave. It would seem that UK Electronics is going the way of UK aviation in the Sixties. Lets of fine names have vanished from the scene over the last few decades as one by one they have fallento takeovers. Ironically, should Ferranti go the way of Plessey it will be one of its own takeovers which put it on the spot. Its problem being a misconceception as to the real worth ofISC, aided by the US paranoia for secrecy and some creative accounting. Now Ferranti is seeking financial assistance (read takeover?) to rescue it. It couldn't have come at a better time for the other consortia bidding for the Eurofighter radar contract. Ferranti's ECR90 had almost clinched it against the MSD-2000 proposal from AEG. The latter (favoured by the West Germans) would compromise the export prospects of the Eurofighter, however, due to its Hughes origins. US secrecy is again the source of the problem. There are also the INS, FLIR and other projects which Ferranti would like a share of, to see the company into the next century. Ironically, its salvation may lie with a merger with BAe with whom it is competing for the INS. Then the UK would have two giant companies, the other being GEC, competing for defence contracts, the MoD would get it's competitive bidding and the UK would not lose yet another company to foreign control. Upheavals in the UK defence electronics business reflect the US Experience. As Jo Ann has pointed out in
this and previous issues, electronics must realign itself away from defence. The apparent easing of tensions between East and West is one of the major reasons but the golden era of large cash hand-outs on lucrative defence contracts has long been fading away anyway. Leaving consumer electronics to the Far East and retreating to telecomms and defence was just statlingthe inevitable. The rest of the year will see very interesting times for the UK electronics industry. Just which parts of Plessey will go to GEC and which parts to Siemens? The carveup should lead to some interesting squabbling behind the scenes and perhaps in public. Already the 3-5 staffthat remain have seen the Opto management carry off their successful buy-out while Signal Technology, the SAW group, just missed theirs, some staffhave gone to boost competitors' efforts and others have been carried off to CasweU to an uncertain future. They must be sitting there wondering how it all came to happen and the reality must be difficult to accept: being taken over by a part-German bid on the 50th Anniversary of WW2. While the Americans are watching as the Japanese companies buy them up, Britainis being sold off to the Germans. Its all just down to business, its open warfare out there and if you can't hack it then sooner or later you get what you deserve. It couldbe that Lord Weinstock is right, however, in saying we should no longer be thinldng of UK electronics, but of European Electronics. New mass market systems such as fibre/optoelectrenics, DBS, mobile phones and HDTVwill be big opportunities for those with the size and the manage-
ment with the guts to make the right decisions. A joint Siemens-GEC-Plessey organisation is perhaps the way to retain an indigenous European electronics industry. Perhaps III-Vs: GaAs ICs and OE, might flourish in the hands of Kaske and Weinstock? Time will tell...this might be our last chance for a place in the 21st Century. In this issue we have a controversy too. In our GaAs IC Symposium issue we have a '~Fechnology Comparison of GaAs & Si" from Plessey's Peter Saul. In the haven of GaAs ICs nary a pair of silicon engineers will be found, which is a shame. We should encourage a mixing of disciplines because each can learn from the other. IC Processing is the central theme of the issue and we have articles which take us through the process with aspects of analog, digital and opto. Sumitomo's article is a glimpse of future long ingots essential for mass production of GaAs ICs. Karl Snss is working on X-ray lithography which may be a key to high throughput of the finest geometries. Plasmatech examines the advances in RIE ofopto devices which will be important for integration ofthese devices. We have another article from CvaAsCODE to help sort out your MMIC fab problems. As far as overviews of the US processing perspective go we have three ofthe best: Anadigics, GigaBit and TriQuint relate their experiences and prospects. Have a good GaAs IC Symposium and sign up for the next issue which has the special theme of materials for III-Vs processing;, everything from precursors to packaging. Roy Szweda V2NV Euro III-Vs Review