Monolythic arrays of 12pn-charge coupled devices3×1cm2each, have been developed and produced for the focal plane instrumentation of the high throughput European Photon Imaging Camera on XMM and the German ABRIXAS x-ray satellite mission. The design parameters have been optimized to match the properties of the x-ray imaging optics as well as the x-ray intensity, energy bandwidth, and characteristic time constants of objects to be observed. The pixel size is150×150&mgr;m2;read-out is performed in parallel with 64 channels in each subunit, resulting in a total of 768 channels; low noise, spectroscopic performance is realized by on-chip integrated JFET electronics; high ohmic, ultrapure bulk material allows full depletion and enhances the efficiency for higher energy x-ray detection. The fabrication process, the layout topology, and the operating conditions guarantee ten years operation in space without performance degradation. ©1997 American Institute of Physics.