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Technology Stocks : Superconductor Technologies : SCON -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Street Hawk who wrote (483)	2/29/2000 12:06:00 AM
From: Marshall	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 903

Re: Bloomberg news - - Why can't these people ever get things right before they rush these stories out? "Superconductor technology allows electricity to flow through special materials with no resistance. In cell phones, that eliminates interference caused by resistance and frees up energy needed to expand range and keep connections from being broken." The inherent resistance of a tuned circuit doesn't cause "interference", it merely reduces the "Q" or quality factor of the filter. The lower you can get this resistance the sharper the filter can tune. Since noise generally occurs at all frequencies the more of it you can "tune out" the more sensitive you can make your receivers. "Superconducting materials, used since the 1960s, must be cooled to extremely low temperatures using expensive processes. That has confined their use to specialty applications. Companies say the benefits of using superconductors on cellular phone systems justify the cost." SCON uses "high temperature superconductors" which don't need to be cooled to these extremely low temperatures to exhibit their effect, matter of fact they have developed their own small self-contained "coolers" that are no larger than a quart milk bottle. The other companies don't have this technology thus the SCON filters can be deployed in otherwise impossible to fit locations such as Church steeples and the various other places Cellular companies are being forced to hide their antennas. Bloomberg is also wrong in that the benefits do indeed outweigh the costs and these have certainly been proven over the years, matter of fact the U.S. Air Force has even tested them out for use on airborne RADAR with promising results. "Conductus Inc., a rival of Superconductor Technologies, has a product for cell phone systems that it cools with helium. Liquid helium boils at about minus 452 degrees Fahrenheit. The company said tests show that its technology can increase the range of wireless networks by as much as 50 times." 50 times? I somehow find that hard to believe. They're a great improvement - yes - and they allow the antennas to be placed farther apart to get the same coverage but if I recall it's not even by a factor of two.