KOIKE Co., Ltd., a manufacturer of materials for electronic devices, located in Chuo-Shi, is recently increasing sales results mainly by “Lithium Tantalate (LT) wafer” used for frequency filter of mobile phone.
KOIKE is making investment to capitalize on the world mobile phone marketthat is expected to expand up to 900 million units a year, and the company holds 50% share in the market.
KOIKE, positively struggling to develop a new business, will establish a new production line for digital home appliances within the year.
LT wafer is used as a filter in a mobile phone to select necessary frequency for telecommunication.
The company used to have 60% world share in “Quartz wafer” which main application is for voice conversion of mobile phone however integrated circuit (IC) has recently dominated in this area, and the company shifted from Quartz to Lithium Tantalate wafer since the Quartz wafer market was not expected to grow more.
In the field of Lithium Tantalate KOIKE entered into a licensing agreement with an American company for the technology, called PyroFree, to control the generation of static electricity, being an obstacle to electronic device manufacturing, and the company became the first one who succeeded in mass-production of PyroFree (anti-electrostatic) wafer.
Based on this technology KOIKE has been continuing to make capital investment, annually around Yen 500million, every year since 2004, in order to increase the market share.
Production volume of LT wafer was 20 thousand in quantity in 2004, and 40 thousand in 2005, twice of the previous year, and the company anticipates 65 thousand wafers for 2006.
His world share is also increasing year by year. KOIKE has 52% share as of this April, and is planning to get 60% share within the year by making capital investment this June.
The sales volume in FY 2005 was \ 2.95billion and the same is expected to exceed \3.2billion in FY 2006 and \3.6 billion in FY 2007.
On the other hand a demand for Quartz wafer has dropped in mobile phone market, but the production of Quartz wafer is continued for keyless entry system of vehicle.
President Koike said enthusiastically “In 3 years I’ll have developed a new business and start the same for which the company will do the best.”
