Gurit, of Wattwil, Switzerland, Hexcel, headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, USA, a license to produce composite material under its Sprint technology and product patents on a non-exclusive basis.

Gurit says this agreement covers both the future use under the license agreement against payment of a license fee and settlement of a 'high single-digit million amount of Swiss Francs' for the past.

Hexcel says it will record a one-time charge for past use of US$7.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2009 and its after-tax impact will be $5.6 million or almost $0.06 per share.

SPRINT materials consist of a layer of fibre reinforcement either side of a precast, precatalysed resin film, with a light tack film on one face. Unlike conventional prepregs, SPRINT fibres remain dry and unimpregnated by the resin until the curing process.