Company Profile
Veeco Instruments
Company Overview
Veeco is a leading provider of Metrology and Process Equipment solutions used by manufacturers in the data storage, semiconductor, wireless, lighting and solar industries. These industries help create a wide range of information age technology and products, such as portable music players, cell phones, PDAs, digital video recorders, backlighting for computers and TVs, architectural and automotive lighting, solar cells and much more. Our products are also critical enabling instruments used in the advancement of scientific research, life sciences and nanotechnology. Veeco's Metrology tools are used to measure at the nanoscale and our Process Equipment tools help create nanoscale devices. Veeco partners with our global customers to deliver the enabling technology, experience and support they need to succeed around the world and around the clock.
Company History
Today's Veeco Instruments Inc. traces its history back to an earlier company which was incorporated in 1945 by two Manhattan Project scientists who created the helium leak detector. The Company's original name "Veeco" stood for Vacuum Electronic Equipment Company. In the 1960's, the original Veeco merged with Lambda, a manufacturer of power supplies, and in the late 1980s was purchased by a British company named Unitech.
In 1990, Edward H. Braun, then COO of Veeco, and a group of senior company executives purchased Veeco's instrument business from Unitech in a management buy-out. The company again used the Veeco Instruments trade name and completed an initial public offering on the Nasdaq National Market in 1994 (NASDAQ: VECO) -- at the time Veeco's sales were approximately $30 million.
Since the management buy-out and IPO, Mr. Braun, as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, has led the company through a transformation focused on supplying equipment to information age industries. Veeco has grown both through internal development and strategic acquisitions -- the Company has completed over a dozen acquisitions to date.
In July 2007 Mr. Braun, age 68, transitioned to his current role as Chairman of the Board of Veeco, with John R. Peeler, 52, joining the Company as Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Peeler was formerly President of JDSU’s (NASDAQ: JDSU) Communications Test and Measurement Division, its largest and most profitable business segment.