Methuen, Massachusetts-based MicroTouch Systems Inc reckons it’s the world’s largest touch screen manufacturer, and is about to extend its dominance by buying, on undisclosed terms, the assets of Touch Technology Inc, maker of analogue resistive and discrete resistive membrane touch screens. Touch products will be absorbed into the MicroTouch line but manufacture will continue at Touch’s base in Austin, Texas. All 60 Touch employees will be retained. Its flagship product is a proprietary five-wire analogue resistive touch screen that uses a voltage gradient on a plastic-on-glass membrane overlay to sense touch. The two layers are coated with a conductive metal oxide on their facing sides and are held apart by tiny spacers; a controller measures the voltage on the glass layer at the point where a finger or other object presses the two layers together. Customers include Motorola Inc, IBM Corp, Litton Industries Inc, Westinghouse Electric Co and AT&T Corp.
