JDS Uniphase Corporation was a company that designed and manufactured products for optical communications networks, communications test and measurement equipment, lasers, optical solutions for authentication and decorative applications, and other custom optics. It was headquartered in Milpitas, California. It was formerly known as JDS Uniphase, prior to a rebranding of its corporate image on September 14, 2005. The legal entity was called JDS Uniphase Corporation, but more commonly called JDSU. On August 2015, JDSU split into two different companies: Viavi Solutions and Lumentum Holdings.HistoryUniphase was started in 1979 in a San Jose, California garage, and made lasers for chip makers and scanners.In 1981, JDS Optics was founded in Canada by Jozef Straus, Philip Garel-Jones, Gary Duck, and Bill Sinclair. The "JDS" is short for Jones, Duck and Straus/Sinclair. The company became JDS Fitel when it formed a partnership with Fitel, a fiber optic and optical connector company.In 1999, JDSU was formed by the merger between JDS Fitel and Uniphase, and became known as JDS Uniphase subsequent to the merger.Three other major fiber companies were acquired by JDS Uniphase during the telecom boom: Optical Coating Laboratory Inc. (OCLI), bought for $2.8 billion and based in Santa Rosa, California, E-TEK Dynamics, bought for $15 billion, and SDL, bought for $45 billion, both based in San Jose, California.In 2003, CEO Straus retired and the company moved its headquarters to San Jose, California, to consolidate its business.In August 3, 2005, the company acquired test and measurement equipment company Acterna for $760 million, which became part of JDSU's Test and Measurement Group. Acterna had been formed by the May 2000 merger of network test solutions developer Wavetek Wandel Goltermann (WWG) and hand-held test equipment developer TTC.
