Agere Systems, Inc. was an

integrated circuit An integrated circuit (IC), also known as a microchip or simply chip, is a set of electronic circuits, consisting of various electronic components (such as transistors, resistors, and capacitors) and their interconnections. These components a ...

components company based in

Allentown, Pennsylvania Allentown (Pennsylvania Dutch language, Pennsylvania Dutch: ''Allenschteddel'', ''Allenschtadt'', or ''Ellsdaun'') is a city in eastern Pennsylvania, United States. The county seat of Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, Lehigh County, it is the List o ...

. Spun out of

Lucent Technologies Lucent Technologies, Inc. was an American Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications equipment company headquartered in Murray Hill, New Jersey, Murray Hill, New Jersey. It was established on September 30, 1996, through the div ...

in 2002, Agere was merged into

LSI Corporation LSI Logic Corporation was an American company founded in Santa Clara, California, was a pioneer in the ASIC and EDA industries. It evolved over time to design and sell semiconductors and software that accelerated storage and networking in dat ...

in 2007. LSI was in turn acquired by Avago Technologies in 2014. In early 2016, Avago acquired the former

Broadcom Corporation Broadcom Corporation was an American fabless manufacturing, fabless semiconductor company that made products for the wireless and broadband communication industry. It was acquired by Avago Technologies for $37billion in 2016 and operates as a ...

, and took on the name Broadcom Inc.

History

Agere was incorporated on August 1, 2000, as a subsidiary of Lucent Technologies and then spun off on June 1, 2002. The name ''Agere'' was that of a Texas-based electronics company that Lucent had acquired in 2000, although the pronunciations of the company names are different. The Texas company was pronounced with three syllables and a hard "g": . The company name was pronounced with two syllables and a hard "g": . Agere is a Latin verb meaning "to act", "to do", or "to make".

Microsoft suit

In 2007, Agere Systems sued

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

for theft of key technology used in Internet telephony. The allegations concern meetings between Agere and Microsoft in 2002 and 2003, where the companies discussed selling Agere's stereophonic acoustic echo cancellation technology to Microsoft. This technology is used to improve the sound of

telephone A telephone, colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that enables two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most ...

and

teleconference A teleconference or telecon is a live exchange of information among several people remote from one another but linked by a communications system. Terms such as audio conferencing, telephone conferencing, and phone conferencing are also someti ...

communications over the Internet. Just before the agreement was to be signed, Microsoft ended the discussions saying that it made a significant breakthrough in its own, heretofore undisclosed research program, and no longer needed Agere's technology. Apart from the main office in Allentown, the company also maintained offices and facilities in: *

Reading, Pennsylvania Reading ( ; ) is a city in Berks County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. The city had a population of 95,112 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census and is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, fourth-most populous ...

, USA: The " Reading Works" facility, formerly Lucent/AT&T and

Bell Labs Nokia Bell Labs, commonly referred to as ''Bell Labs'', is an American industrial research and development company owned by Finnish technology company Nokia. With headquarters located in Murray Hill, New Jersey, Murray Hill, New Jersey, the compa ...

. Closed in 2003. *

Orlando, Florida Orlando ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Orange County, Florida, United States. The city proper had a population of 307,573 at the 2020 census, making it the fourth-most populous city in Florida behind Jacksonville, Florida, Jacksonville ...

, USA: The "Orlando Plant" was Agere's newest wholly owned wafer fabrication facility in the world. Opened in 1984 by AT&T, it was known for a time in the late 1990s as "Cirent Semiconductor" as it was operated as a joint venture between Lucent Technologies and Cirrus Logic Corporation. The Orlando Plant was also home to Bell Labs' Advanced Development and Research Facility (ADRF). Closed in 2005. *

Dallas, Texas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

, USA: Agere Optoelectronics South (OES), formerly Hermann Technologies. Acquired in 2000, closed in 2002. *

Irwindale, California } Irwindale is a city in the San Gabriel Valley, in Los Angeles County, California. The population was 1,472 at the 2020 census, 1,422 at the 2010 census. The ZIP Codes serving the area are 91010, which is shared with Duarte, 91702, which i ...

, USA: Acquired by Emcore Corporation. * Whitefield, India: Located in

Bangalore Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the southern States and union territories of India, Indian state of Kar ...

, involved in

ASIC An application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC ) is an integrated circuit (IC) chip customized for a particular use, rather than intended for general-purpose use, such as a chip designed to run in a digital voice recorder or a high-efficien ...

design and software development. * Raanana, Israel: This office was based on Modem-Art, a developer of advanced processor technology for 3G/

UMTS The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a 3G mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. UMTS uses Wideband Code Division Multiple Access, wideband code-division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technolog ...

mobile devices, which Agere acquired in 2005. *

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...

and

Shenzhen Shenzhen is a prefecture-level city in the province of Guangdong, China. A Special economic zones of China, special economic zone, it is located on the east bank of the Pearl River (China), Pearl River estuary on the central coast of Guangdong ...

. * Nieuwegein, Netherlands: This former NCR /

AT&T AT&T Inc., an abbreviation for its predecessor's former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the w ...

/ Lucent Technologies division known under the name WCND (Wireless Communication Network Division) was active in the development of

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for Wireless LAN, local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by ...

technology and closed in December 2004. *

Ascot, Berkshire Ascot () is a town in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, in Berkshire, England. It is south of Windsor, east of Bracknell and west of London. It is most notable as the location of Ascot Racecourse, home of the Royal Ascot meeti ...

, UK: R&D and engineering site developing processor technology for GSM/GPRS/EDGE. *

Tres Cantos Tres Cantos () is a Municipalities of Spain, municipality of Spain located in Community of Madrid. Originally belonging to Colmenar Viejo, it seceded from the latter municipality in 1991, becoming the youngest municipality in the region. The urban ...

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

, Spain: Wafer fab. Manufacturing of 0.3, 0.35 and 0.5 micron CMOS devices. Closed in 2001.

References

External links

* {{Authority control 2002 establishments in Pennsylvania 2007 disestablishments in Pennsylvania Alcatel-Lucent American companies established in 2002 American companies disestablished in 2007 Companies based in Allentown, Pennsylvania Computer companies established in 2002 Computer companies disestablished in 2007 Defunct companies based in Pennsylvania Defunct computer companies of the United States Defunct computer hardware companies Defunct semiconductor companies of the United States Fabless semiconductor companies History of Allentown, Pennsylvania Technology companies established in 2002 Technology companies disestablished in 2007