Barco's ATC main display panels manufactured on Samsung's LCD production line 6
KORTRIJK, BELGIUM, 6 July 2006 - Visualization specialist Barco has moved over to Samsung's sixth LCD production line for the assembly of its 2k x 2k Air Traffic Control main display panels. Samsung's enhanced LCD production process will ensure Barco of long-term availability and better optical specifications for its ISIS main displays and ISONA integrated display stations. The move marks a new step in the process of continuous quality improvement within the partnership between both companies.
Continuous quality improvement is a standard policy within Barco as well as a key factor in the company's partnership with Samsung, with whom Barco has an exclusive long-term supply agreement. This philosophy ensures that market leading products remain market leading, while compatibility and long-term support are maintained. Moving the LCD assembly for Barco's ISIS and ISONA products to production line 6 for mass production is the next logical step in this continuous process of quality improvement. It will also guarantee access to the latest production methods and processes as well as long-term availability and support until at least 2015. Several hundreds of ISIS and ISONA units with display panels produced on Samsung’s latest production line are already successfully in operational service."Given the very fast evolutions in LCD technology and production efficiency, LCD manufacturers can only guarantee long-term availability and support on the most recent and efficient production lines," says Frank Timmermans, senior Marketing & Sales Director of Barco's Air Traffic Management business unit. "We consider the move to LCD production line 6 as our key differentiator to our competitors in the 2k x 2k LCD market, whose products are still based on second generation technology."
"The development of this new 2k x 2k LCD represents a major milestone in the exclusive collaboration between Barco and Samsung," says Danny Sergeant, Vice-President of the BarcoView division. "We believe that this multi-million dollar investment of Barco in R&D and tooling will secure the long-term supply of the best quality LCD on the market, thanks to Samsung's latest advances in LCD technology and its efficient processes of mass production."
The move to Samsung's LCD production line 6 has resulted in significant enhancements of Barco's 2k x 2k main display panels with respect to viewing angle, contrast ratio, color consistency and artifact-free viewing. Barco's ISIS and ISONA panels are now manufactured with Samsung's 8-domain Super-PVA (SPVA) technology, resulting in the widest effective viewing angle available in the market. Barco's main displays also feature a true single scan 2k x 2k resolution panel, avoiding a parallel scan on four quadrants of 1024 x 1024. A single scan panel removes the need for frame buffering, which results in faster image loading and lower latency.
The technology upgrades of Barco's ISIS and ISONA display panels are backwards compatible with the installed base and do not affect any spares policy or Integrated Logistics Support (ILS) strategy. As all electronics and Line Replaceable Units (LRU) remain identical, ISIS and ISONA customers can continue to rely on Barco's proven service reliability.
Today, ISIS has reached a worldwide installed base of over 5000 operational units in 75 countries. This represents approximately 100 million operating hours in real-time safety-critical Air Traffic Control applications. Barco's ISIS main displays have been chosen by Air Navigation Service Providers worldwide, including Airservices Australia (AsA); Air traffic Management Bureau (ATMB), China; Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), USA; National Air Traffic Services (NATS), UK; Deutsche Flugsicherung (DFS), Germany; Direction des Services de la Navigation Aérienne (DSNA), France; L'Ente Nazionale Assistenza al Volo (ENAV), Italy; and Aeropuertos Españoles y Navegación Aérea (AENA), Spain.
About Barco
Barco, a global technology company headquartered in Kortrijk, Belgium, designs and develops visualization products for a variety of professional markets. Barco has its own facilities for Sales & Marketing, Customer Support, R&D and Manufacturing in Europe, North America and Asia Pacific. For fiscal year 2005, Barco posted net sales of euro 712.0 million. Barco’s ordinary shares are listed on the Brussels/Euronext stock exchange. Barco is a BEL 20 and a Next 150 company. Share information may be accessed on Bloomberg under the symbol BAR BB and on Reuters under BARBt.BR.
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