TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY AND AIXTRON AG STARTING CO-OPERATION ON GAN TECHNOLOGY

!!! Press Release !!!

TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY AND AIXTRON AG STARTING CO-OPERATION ON GAN TECHNOLOGY

Aachen/Shanghai/Beijing, July 15th, 2002 - During AIXTRON's recent technical Seminar held in Beijing and Shanghai this year, an important milestone in the co-operation between Chinese compound semiconductor industry and AIXTRON was achieved and a scientific co-operation agreement has now been signed between the Department of Electronics Engineering, Tsinghua University and the AIXTRON Group.

The main aim of the agreement is to increase technology transfer between partners especially in the field of GaN technology. "State-of-the-art blue LEDs grown in our Planetary Reactor® installed at the university enable our institute to pick up on any business opportunities in this field. Electronic and Optoelectronic devices will play a crucial role also in the rapidly growing Chinese economy," comments Prof. Yi Luo, responsible for scientific research work. This agreement focuses especially on electronic applications of this material for high-power and high-frequency applications. Circuits in harsh environments such as close to automotive or other engines, cell phone base stations, radar systems and in the future possibly microwave ovens will all benefit from these new technologies which are able to provide cheap and powerful circuits currently not yet available. All these applications will benefit from the unique properties of the GaN. However, producing such state-of-the-art GaN structures requires extreme controllability, reproducibility, and wafer uniformity especially in the MOCVD process. These tough requirements are met by the AIX 2000HT MOCVD system that AIXTRON had installed earlier.

"With the proven background of this institute in GaN LED technology this partner is an excellent addition to our existing network of AIXcellence in the field of GaN electronics. Our joint work will open up the path to young Chinese students and researchers that will promote the III-V industry in China in the near future," argues Prof. Dr. Michael Heuken, Vice President Corporate Research and Development of the AIXTRON group. "In addition our own research on this topic partly funded by the European Community and the German ministry of science and technology is backed up by our own investment in this co-operation." The AIXTRON Group has installed an impressive number of systems in mainland China. Examples in R&D as well as in industry are the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology as well as Hi-Tech Optoelectronics and SBBLT.

With an installed base of well over 650 systems world-wide, as verified by VLSI Research Inc., AIXTRON is the world leading supplier of equipment for semiconductor epitaxy and has been rated once more amongst the 2002 10 BEST in its category in the most recent VLSI Customer Satisfaction Survey. Its equipment is used by a diverse range of customers worldwide to manufacture critical, advanced components such as HBTs, PHEMTs, MESFETs, Lasers, LEDs, Detectors and VCSELs used in fibre optic communications systems, wireless and mobile telephony applications, optical storage devices, illumination, signaling and lighting, as well as a range of other leading edge technologies. The company has an extensive service and support network in over 15 countries. AIXTRON's many customers include Agere, Alcatel, Anritsu, ATMI, Avalon, AXT, Epson, Honeywell, Infineon, IQE, IQE Silicon Compounds, ITT, JDS-Uniphase, Kopin, LumiLeds, Mitsubishi, Motorola, Nortel, Optospeed, Osram, Procomp, Samsung, Showa Denko, Siemens, ST Microelectronics, Sumitomo, Thales, UEC, VPEC as well as numerous Japanese corporations. AIXTRON systems have also been installed in the most renowned research institutes worldwide, including CNRS, Fraunhofer Institute, ITRI-OES, JPL, Meijo University, Research Center Jülich, RIKEN, Sandia Nat Lab, University of Tokyo and Tsinghua University. AIXTRON is very active in advancing MOCVD technology through collaborations and joint R&D projects with major partners worldwide. AIXTRON AG (FSE: AIX ISIN DE0005066203) is included in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index World and the MSCI World Index.

For further information please contact:

Dr. Claus Ehrenbeck
Head of Investor Relations and
Corporate Communications
AIXTRON AG
Kackertstr. 15 - 17
D-52072 Aachen, Germany
Phone:+49 241 8909 444
Fax: +49 241 8909 445
E-mail: invest@aixtron.com