FRANCE AND THE U.S. EXCHANGE IDEAS AT THE FRENCH-AMERICAN CONFERENCE FOR INNOVATION THIS MONTH, TAKING PLACE ALONGSIDE PHOTONICS WEST  IN SAN FRANCISCO

Chicago, January 11, 2010 (word count: 936)
During the Photonics West trade show to be held in San Francisco from January 26 to 28, 2010, French optics/photonics competitiveness clusters, together with nine of their member companies, will take part in a French-American meeting about technological innovation: the French-American Conference for Photonics Innovation. On that occasion, innovative French companies in the sector will introduce their R&D projects and expectations in terms of technological partnerships. This exchange forum on innovation will take place on Tuesday, January 26, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at San Francisco’s Westin Hotel, located steps away from the Photonics West trade show. Click the following links to download the official flyer and catalog for the event:

Flyer (500 kb .pdf)

Catalog (4 Mb .pdf)

The French delegation will include the three competitiveness clusters specializing in optics and photonics in France: ROUTE DES LASERS, POPSud OPTITEC and SYSTEMATIC, represented by the OPTICSVALLEY association.

This French-American meeting is organized by Ubifrance and the DGCIS (the French Economy, Industry and Labor Ministry’s Department for Competitiveness, Industry and Services) in order to bring about opportunities for cooperation and technological partnerships to the most innovative small and medium enterprises and research laboratories in France and the United States. It is expected that reciprocal discussions will be organized between key French and American players attending the Photonics West trade show. To kick off the event, two eminent French and American specialists, Jean-Claude Sirieys, chairman of CNOP (National Optics and Photonics Committee) and Alexei Glebov, president and CEO at Optigrate and member of the Florida Photonics Cluster, will offer their perspective on the outlook for photonics in France and the United States.

The United States are a major worldwide player in photonics and optics. French companies boast acknowledged proficiency in the sector, which suggests opportunities for setting up synergies or finding positive complementary conditions. The avenues for research are many:

Lasers and related instrumentation
Adaptable optics
Optical fiber
Optical coatings
Materials used in optics

To close the meeting, participants will be invited to a cocktail held at the Westin Hotel, which will begin at 6:30 p.m.

About the French companies in attendance:

Alpao is a manufacturer of adaptive optics for the research and the industry. It offers very rapid deformable mirrors with large strokes, extremely sensitive wavefront sensors, and complete adaptive optics loops. All of these products have been designed and adapted according to the application: astronomy, ophthalmology, microscopy, wireless optical communications and laser. www.alpao.com

Amplitude Systems has become the specialist in the field of femtosecond lasers. Our lasers range from oscillators to amplifiers including fiber lasers. It is the only company offering both crystal based lasers and fiber based lasers. It has launched high energy lasers with more than 2mJ energy per pulse, ulrashort pulses down to 50fs and more than 20W average power lasers. www.amplitude-systemes.com

Aquitaine Valo, the Technology Transfer Office of Université de Bordeaux, works in-between researchers and industrial partners. It is dedicated to promote laboratories skills & know-how, support and orientate innovative projects toward company needs, protect Intellectual Property of Universities & affiliates Schools. www.aquitaine-valo.fr

Azur Light Systems / Alphanov is a dedicated resource for the development of laser systems and their applications (laser processing and micro-machining, Terahertz applications, medical applications) in support of industrial and academic partners of the Bordeaux – Route des Lasers cluster. www.alphanov.com

Cilas is an expert in Optical Components and Thin Film Coatings. It works in Defense, Space, Astronomy, Scientific, Solar and Industry markets. It develops and manufactures high precision coated components in the visible range from 250 nm to 2,5 µm: Anti-reflective coatings, metal and dielectric mirrors, dichroics, longwave and shortwave pass filters, narrowband and broadband filters, Micro-structured components using lithography technique. www.cilas.com

Cordouan Technologies is a young startup which develops, manufactures and sales scientific optoelectronic instrumentation for physical chemistry analysis and optical metrology. Interests of research: nanotechnologies, nanomaterials metrology, laser beam and optical metrology. www.cordouan-tech.com

Egide SA is a European firm with international scope specialized in the manufacturing of hermetic packages for sensitive electronic or photonic components. The group is active in high-tech sectors including security, defence, space, aeronautics, telecommunications, automotives and medical. www.egide.fr

Eolite Systems develops and manufactures high power pulsed fiber lasers for a wide range of fine-technology micromachining applications, including cutting, engraving, ablation, drilling, annealing, printing, scribing, patterning… in different industry such as Photovoltaic, Semiconductor, Micro-electronic , Metal-processing. www.eolite.com

Imagine Optic is the world’s leading providers of Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensing hardware and software, adaptive optics technologies and professional services in applied optics. It works with scientists and industrials in domains including pure science, industrial quality control, space and defense, semiconductors and many others. www.imagine.optic.com

About the competitiveness clusters:

ROUTE DES LASERS
The Route des Lasers competitiveness cluster gathers industry, research and education actors from the optics and lasers sector in Bordeaux, Aquitaine. It is dedicated to facilitate optics and lasers technology development and diffusion, primarily laser systems and their applications, metrology and imaging and innovating physics, in industrial sectors such as: aeronautics, health, vision, chemistry, food industries, electronics. www.routedeslasers.com

POPSud OPTITEC
Optitec is a leading French competitiveness cluster specialized on complex optics and imaging systems dedicated to space, aeronautics, defense, medical and green-photonics application. It is a major European-scale centre for optics-photonics and image processing with more than 20% of French R&D in optics, 12 363 jobs for qualified staff, including 3 900 for researchers and engineers. www.popsud.org

OPTICSVALLEY/SYSTEMATIC
Opticsvalley is the Paris-Region’s network in the fields of Optics, Electronics and Software. Supported by local and regional governments, Opticsvalley unites more than 160 members: large, medium and small sized companies, research and training centers, as well as institutional partners. www.opticsvalley.org

For more information, please contact:

UBIFRANCE – FRENCH TRADE COMMISSION
Gaétan Gachet
IT Trade Advisor, San Francisco
Tel.: (415) 458-4573
E-mail: gaetan.gachet@ubifrance.fr
Web: www.ubifrance.fr

or:

FRENCH TECHNOLOGY PRESS OFFICE
205 North Michigan Avenue, Suite 3740
Chicago, IL 60601
Fax: (312) 327-5261
E-mail: contact.ftpo@ubifrance.fr

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