Alcatel and Mitsubishi announce joint development and marketing agreement.

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 26, 1996--Alcatel Optronics and Mitsubishi Electric Corporation have agreed to develop and market a new generation of fully-compatible integrated optoelectronic modules for SDH (Synchronous Digital Hierarchy) and SONET (Synchronous Optical Network) transmission system.

The families of integrated modules will cover bit-rates of 155, 622 and 2488 Mbit/s at both 1310 nm and 1550 nm wavelengths. Their functionalities exceed the ITU-T G.957 recommendation.

These advanced, new generation products are very compact. High-performance semiconductor lasers and photo-detectors combined with sophisticated, high-speed custom integrated circuits ensure ease of use and offer new flexibility to systems designers.

The two companies' products will be fully-compatible in size, functionality and pin-out.

Members of the product family are already available in volume production and the full range will be available, independently from both suppliers, by the end of 1996.

Alcatel and Mitsubishi will hold a press conference at the OFC `96 Conference and exhibition on Tuesday, Feb. 27, 1996, at 3:30 pm PST in conference room J-2 of the San Jose Convention Center to discuss details of the agreement. Each company will also have an exhibit booth at the conference through February 29.

Headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif., the Electronic Device Group of Mitsubishi Electronics America, Inc. markets optoelectronic products, microwave GaAs FETs/HEMTs/MMICs, RF power transistors and modules, SAW filters and MIC amplifiers, standard and application-specific memory ICs, standard and custom memory modules, IC cards, gate arrays and embedded cell arrays, microcontrollers, application-specific standard products (ASSPs), digital and analog standard ICs, JPEG and MPEG codecs, contact image sensors, color TAFT LCDs, and flexible disk drive products. Mitsubishi serves its customers locally through a North American sales network as well as globally through the worldwide infrastructure of the Mitsubishi Electric Corporation.

Alcatel Optronics markets a full range of optoelectronic products for telecommunications. Operating a new, state-of-the-art manufacturing plant in France, Alcatel Optronics has rapidly become a leading supplier of high-performance laser and photo-detector modules, optical amplifiers and other integrated optoelectronic modules with a particular emphasis on components for high-bit-rate and WDM (multi-color) systems.

CONTACT: For Information regarding this press release:

Alcatel Optronics

Philippe Bregi, 33 1 64 49 49 00

or

For Commercial Information regarding these products:

Alcatel Optronics in Europe

Bruno Vincent, 33 1 64 49 49 12

or

Alcatel ITS Inc. in USA

Moise Augis, 800/201-3864

or

Alcatel ITS in Japan

Kohroku Matsukawa, 81 3 5424 8550