November 28, 2011 PVD Products announces it has signed a lease for 17,000 square feet of prime manufacturing space located at 35 Upton Drive in Wilmington MA. This location will increase PVD's current space by a factor of 2.5, greatly improving our ability to keep up with our increased sales volume. PVD Products will move to its new location in June 2012 after build-out of the space is completed.

October 26, 2011 A video of the PLD/MBE Systems workflow has been posted on YouTube.

May 17th, 2011 PVD Products announces that it has received yet another large purchase order for the deposition of thin MgO buffer layer material on 1 cm wide metallic tapes for the subsequent growth of HTS materials. This IBAD coated conductor system is based on ion beam sputtering from a large MgO target with an ion beam assist source. The system will use multiple lanes of 1-cm wide tape and provide in-situ RHEED analysis of the growing material with tape lengths up to 1 km long. This is the third system purchased by this customer over the past few years indicating strong confidence in PVD Products capabilities to provide complex coated conductor deposition technology.

May 2nd, 2011 PVD Products has selected PicoTech as its new representative in Israel. Dr. James Greer says that PicoTech brings both strong sales, service, and technical support to its customers and should be a perfect fit for the type of equipment that PVD Products sells.

April 14th, 2011 PVD Products, Inc. delivers its first Vis/NIR Resonant MAPLE System to University of Western Ontario. This system includes a frequency doubled Nd:YAG laser with OPO that covers the range of ~680 - 2400 nm. Included in the automated system is a MAPLE target. Solid targets can be used as well. This is the first commercial Resonant MAPLE system on the market.

March 4th, 2011 PVD Products has received a large purchase order to build a unique reel-to-reel tool dedicated to IBAD MgO deposition for High Temperature Superconducting (HTS) coated-conductor applications. The system will include the ability to map out the ion beam profile from linear RF ion sources to provide optimized uniformity on the substrate surface. The system will also include in-situ diagnostics such as scanning RHEED to monitor the film quality within the deposition zone along the length of the tape. This system expands PVD Products coated conductor product line which currently includes reel-to-reel Pulsed Laser Deposition and magnetron sputtering systems used for deposition of HTS materials as well as a wide variety of buffer layers including ceria and protective over-layers such as silver. This new IBAD system is scheduled to be delivered in 2011.

February 28, 2011 PVD Products delivers its third reel-to-reel coated conductor machine to a major Japanese superconducting research lab. This new PLD system includes an extended length heater providing for much faster tape speeds during the film growth process. This third system is earmarked for the deposition of buffer layers such as cerium oxide at rates of 100 m/hour. The system includes PVD's multi-track capability with a multi-zone heater. It also includes PVD's unique XYΘ target manipulator that handles three six-inch diameter targets. The XYΘ manipulator provides for a constant plume direction for extremely long periods of time. Also the system uses PVD's large coated-conductor Intelligent Window (link to IW here), and full multi plume capability. Both PVD's Intelligent Window and XYΘ target manipulator make it possible to grow 1 km lengths of tape without having to stop deposition and break vacuum to clean optics or resurface targets. The system is mated Coherent STEEL excimer laser to provide high growth rates. The system, once integrated will provide buffer layers on 1-cm wide tapes with a length of 1 km in five hours time. This third sale to Japan indicates the customer's strong confidence in PVD's capabilities to provide a unique high quality product that meets the customer's ever increasing needs.

February 12, 2011 PVD Products has received a large order for a UHV PLD/MBE 2500 deposition system from a customer based in China. The PLD/MBE 2500 includes six 2-inch diameter targets on a dual axis rotary feedthrough with water cooled stage, high temperature heater mounted on motorized Z-stage for variable target-to-substrate distance, along with PVD's unique Intelligent Window. This UHV system will incorporate five effusion cells on the back wall of the chamber besides the standard PLD/MBE components. The system also includes a Staib high pressure RHEED package, RF substrate bias, and PVD's dual wafer loadlock. The system demonstrates the unique nature of PVD's PLD/MBE 2000 series that allows the integration of a wide variety of deposition tools such as PLD and effusion cells, atom, ion, or sputter sources all within one package.

January 2011 PVD Products is now offering a line of DC to DC and RF/DC switch boxes for existing sputter systems. The DC switch can take the power from one DC power supply and send it to one of up to six different magnetron sputtering sources via computer control. The RF/DC switch box will allow the customer to quickly switch from RF sputtering to DC sputtering (or vice-versa) via computer control.

October 2010 PVD Products books another order for a Reel-to-Reel multi-lane/multi plume PLD system for deposition of ceramic buffer layers onto metal tapes. This system is designed with multi-lane/multi plume capability, an extended length substrate heater to preheat the tape traveling at high speeds, and is fully computer controlled. This system is designed to deposit buffer layer material at 100 m/hour.

September 2010 PVD Products has booked an order for a 2nd turn-key combinatorial sputter deposition system. This system is designed for 100 mm diameter wafers and uses smaller 1" targets. This system is scheduled to ship in May 2011.

September 2010 PVD Products has installed a turn-key combinatorial sputter deposition system for 300 mm diameter wafers in a major semiconductor fab. This system includes four PVD Products Titan in-situ tiltable magnetron sputter sources mounted on motorized Z-stages. Each source is connected to both an RF and DC power supply through a programmable RF/DC switch. The 300 mm wafer is transferred to a wafer holder mounted to a vacuum compatible X-Y stage with 1 micron positioning resolution. Co-sputtering from up to four sources through a metal mask creates a well defined pad on the wafer. Using the X-Y stage to step location and using the sources at different power levels and/or varying target to substrate distances allows the deposition of a wide range of varying material compositions in a computer controlled fashion. This system is also mated to a central robot wafer handler.

July 2010 PVD Products had installed a unique turn-key PLD system for 300 mm wafers in a large semiconductor fab. This system is married to a central robot and wafer handler. Besides using one of PVD's unique X-Y-Θ type target manipulator this PLD this system also included a multipocket electron beam evaporation unit and high temperature heater.

April 2010 PVD Products has installed a turn-key coated conductor sputtering system for the deposition of cerium oxide buffer layers and protective silver metal layers onto 1 cm wide metal tapes. The system utilizes PVD Products multi-lane tape transport system with a 6" x 3" rectangular magnetron source for large area deposition. Included with the system is a substrate heater used for cerium oxide buffer layers and a substrate cooling stage for deposition of silver protective layers.The system is completely computer controlled. The system can deposit 1 micron of Ag at a tape speed of 15 m/hour.