!!! Press Release !!!

Aachen / St. Petersburg, October 14, 2003, - AIXTRON is proud to report a further success in the solar cell equipment market. The IOFFE Physico - Technical Institute, located in St. Petersburg, Russia, has recently ordered another AIX 200/4 system for the R&D and production of epitaxial compound layer structures for solar cells required by the satellite industry. Founded in 1918 the IOFFE Institute is one of Russia's largest institutions for research in physics and technology with a wide variety of operating projects. Prof. Zhores I. Alferov, director of the IOFFE Institute, who was awarded with the Nobel prize in Physics in 2000 for laying stable foundations for today's communications technologies based on compound semiconductor devices such as laser diodes and fast transistors, led the institute not only to one of Russia's most important scientific but also to a very successful educational center, which enjoys world-wide recognition. Prof. Viacheslav M. Andreev, head of Photovoltaics laboratory of the Ioffe Institute, was awarded with European Becquerel Prize in 2001 for “Outstanding Merits in Photovoltaics”.

Dr. Vladimir Lantratov, Senior Researcher at the Photovoltaics laboratory of the IOFFE Technical Institute comments: "Based on the good experience of my colleagues made with the AIXTRON MOCVD equipment, at the Semiconductor Heterostructures Physics laboratory, we have chosen the AIX 200/4 MOCVD system for our research project. AIXTRON's recognized superior technology and excellent customer references on research with MOCVD especially regarding solar cells have been convincing. We look forward to a very fruitful cooperation as IOFFE Technical Institute and AIXTRON established an excellent relationship for many years now."

Dr. Bernd Schulte, Executive Vice President and COO of AIXTRON's Compound Semiconductor unit adds: "We are delighted that IOFFE Institute has once again decided for AIXTRON’s proven technology which emphasizes AIXTRON’s worldwide lead in this field. We are very proud to have the internationally well renowned IOFFE Technical Institute as our partner. We are sure that the AIX 200/4 state-of-the art research tool will soon deliver to IOFFE fast quality results providing excellent film thickness and composition.”

AIXTRON's extremely successful R&D tool AIX 200/4 offers outstanding homogeneity in film thickness and composition with an excellent electrical and optical film thickness. The AIX 200/4 reactors can be used for both R&D and small scale production. With the option of a wafer capacity of either 1x4", 3x2", 1x3" or 1x2" the MOCVD system can be adjusted to the individual customer's requirements.

AIXTRON is, as verified by an independent market research institute, the world leading supplier of equipment for semiconductor epitaxy. 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 fiber 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. AIXTRON AG (FSE: AIX ISIN DE0005066203) is listed in the Prime Standard and Tec DAX of the German Stock Exchange (Deutsche Börse) and is included in the MSCI World Index.

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© AIXTRON AG, October 14, 2003

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