Microwave Associates
Microwave Associates produced microwave components in Boston.
They obtained a license to Bell’s transistor technology and attended the April 1952 Symposium.
As shown here, they advertised in November 1952 that they were establishing a manufacturing facility to produce a “complete semiconductor line” including NPN transistors under license to Western Electric.
Click on this image for a larger scale view.
But there is no sign of progress being made with a transistor range. In 1958 Art Uhlir joined the company having previously worked at Bell Laboratories on microwave semiconductors.
“At Microwave Associates I came in as Director of Semiconductor Research in 1958 and worked to proselytize the use of junction diodes in microwave devices. The company's total sales of T-R tubes, waveguide circuits, magnetrons, and point-contact diodes was then about $3 million. They were making more money on point-contact silicon diodes than the total for the company. Their MA 1N23E diodes mixer diodes were envied by Western Electric.” [Ward 2004]
Thus by 1958 there were no signs of any commercial transistors at least as far as JEDEC registrations can confirm. In fact, Microwave Associates had only a modest number of their own JEDEC registrations by 1958 which were all point-contact silicon microwave diodes:
The above were all point contact diodes for microwave applications. The double ended types could be used with an adaptor to enable them to be used in a polarised holder.In addition the range included non JEDEC types such as the MA425 in a polarised outline shown right.
Microwave Associates also second sourced other microwave detectors as was common in the industry and in July 1954 summarised their range as follows as advertised in Electronics for that month:
Partial Composite from a Full Page Advertisement Electronics July 1954
In 1960 Microwave Associates commercialized what appears to be their first JEDEC registered junction diode type: Their 1N903-1N908 series of high speed silicon mesa junction diodes hermetically sealed in a sub-miniature glass encapsulation. [JEDEC 2772]
The World had to wait over 25 years for the transistors promised in 1952: the 2N6665 NPN silicon transistor for low power RF and IF applications up to 700MHz. [JEDEC 6712]
References
Ward J 2004 Semiconductor Museum Oral History of Art Uhlir