ATHOL, MA-The L.S. Starrett Co. has acquired the assets of Tru-Stone Technologies (Waite Park, MN). Tru-Stone Technologies provides high- precision, custom-engineered granite machine bases and accessories to manufacturers of inspection

• In response to the needs of biophotonics customers, Edmund Optics (EO, Barrington, NJ) will introduce 20 new product lines designed to work in the ultraviolet. Products introduced in the

NORWOOD, MA-Instron receives accreditation from NVLAP to perform displacement verifications in compliance with ASTM E 2309. Instron is one of the first calibration providers to receive accreditation for the standard.

DEARBORN, MI-Ford Motor Co. has elected Alan Mulally as president and chief executive officer. He has also been elected to the board of directors. Bill Ford will continue his duties

AKRON, OH-In order to support its growing customer base in Southeast Asia, U.S.-based machine vision supplier Applied Vision has opened a service and support center in Malaysia and a direct sales office in Singapore.

BARRINGTON, NJ-In its annual report to shareholders, Edmund Optics (EO) reported 13 consecutive quarters of year-on-year sales growth. The latest quarter marked a 10.6% increase in consolidated revenue in 2005 and a 5% improvement in profitability.

NATICK, MA-Cognex Corp. announces a series of free machine vision seminars exclusively for manufacturing professionals. These half-day events show how machine vision can be applied to improve quality and reduce costs.

MUNICH, GERMANY-This year, MVTec Software GmbH commemorates its 10-year anniversary. MVTec is a developer and manufacturer of standard software for machine vision that is used worldwide.

SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO, CA-Endevco Corp., a designer, manufacturer and supplier of mission-critical sensor instrumentation to the military and defense community, announces the delivery of the first ship set of sensors for the F-35 Lightning II flight test program to Lockheed Martin (Ft. Worth, TX).

NUREMBERG, GERMANY-Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D, Nuremberg, Germany), has acquired Opto-Control Elektronik Prüfsysteme (Bochum, Germany). The acquisition adds high-precision automatic optical inspection (AOI) systems to Siemens's Siplace surface mount technology