OMRON Corporation (Headquarters: Kyoto City, Japan; President & CEO: Yoshihito Yamada) has decided to invest approximately JPY10 billion over the next two years to boost its business in medium and small-sized liquid-crystal display backlights and is directed at the market for smartphones, which is expanding both in Japan and abroad. This investment will be principally aimed at the input of technical human resources to expand capacity for backlight-unit development and production, the design and manufacture of high-precision metal molds, and reinforcement of setups for automated production.

Recent years have seen the progressive emergence of the ubiquitous society. Mobile phones enable people to obtain the information they want and communicate with anyone else at any time and place, and the market for them continues to expand worldwide. Under these circumstances, there are mounting needs for higher levels of quality and performance as well as more prompt supply of products. In high-spec segments in fields such as smartphones and tablet terminals, there are rising levels of thinness, resolution, and screen size, and this is accelerating the trend toward liquid-crystal displays that have higher definition and are thinner. Given this trend, manufacturers need to achieve higher assembly precision for backlight units, which are key components of these devices, and this is propelling improvements in quality and performance. As the leading company in design, manufacture, and sale of backlight units for medium- and small-sized liquid-crystal displays, we have made a vital contribution to the advancement of smartphones and the market for them through our longstanding high precision processing technology, as indicated by the company's success in mass producing film backlight units with a thickness of 0.23 millimeters, the world's thinnest, in 2008.

Against this backdrop, there are rising expectations for us to supply thin, high-brightness backlights. The market for smartphones is bound to expand further in the future, accompanied by wants and needs for higher definitions and slimmer profiles in liquid-crystal displays for them. In response, we are proactively making further additional investments for technology development, and are determined to creating products with higher levels of quality and performance while assuring their stable and prompt supply by harnessing all the capabilities of the entire Group to this end.

More specifically, we are committing about 50 technical personnel from all Group companies to OMRON Precision Technology Co., Ltd., our backlight business, (Headquarters: Tsurugashima City, Japan; President & Representative Director Ken Tanikawa; hereinafter referred to as "OPT") in a program to strengthen our research & development activities there, reinforce our setup for design and manufacture of metal molds as the foundation for mass production and higher performance, and accelerate automated production. In addition, we are newly opening the OPT Mishima Factory (in the city of Mishima, Shizuoka Prefecture). Beginning in the summer of 2015, this location will operate as a site for manufacture of molds for backlights directed to high-spec smartphones, to accommodate the future growth in demand for them. With operation of the Mishima Factory, we plan to greatly shorten the lead time from design to manufacture while augmenting our production capacity for molds during fiscal 2015. In addition, by consolidating our domestic production of molds and concentrating our capabilities for technology development, we are going to promote automation in the assembly process through application of our control technology (OMRON's special competence) and know-how. This will empower us for swift response to the rapid changes in product cycle and requirements for faster creation of thinner products with higher definitions.

Besides expanding our production capacity, this investment will further strengthen our powers of technology development and enable us to continue meeting market needs in high-spec segments. Accordingly, we shall endeavor to assure the growth of our backlight business in fiscal 2016, attain the targets of our long-term management vision Value Generation 2020*, and achieve even more growth in the future.

We at OMRON Corporation are going to continue actively taking up the challenge of new technology development in various businesses by making the most of our distinctive expertise centered around sensing and control technology, to help build a future world and society in which people can lead enjoyable and fulfilling lives.

* Value Generation 2020 (VG2020) is the long-term management vision of the OMRON Group, covering the ten-year period 2011 - 2020. To attain its goals, we are making efforts to hasten our growth and provide new value to more customers on a global scale.

Outline of OMRON Precision Technology Co., Ltd.

Company name: OMRON Precision Technology Co., Ltd.
Location: 6-1-1 Fujimi, Tsurugashima City, Saitama Prefecture, Japan
Date of establishment: April 18, 1977
Representative: Ken Tanikawa, President & Representative Director
Capital: JPY448M (100% outlay by OMRON Corporation)
Employees: 247 (consolidated total: about 5,000) - As of May 2014
URL: http://www.omron-precision.co.jp/en/

Outline of the Mishima Factory

Factory name: OMRON Precision Technology Mishima Factory
Location: on the grounds of the Mishima Office of OMRON Corporation (66 Matsumoto, Mishima City, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan)
Site area: 33,891.61 m2
Building area: 8,392.27 m2
Total floor area: 30,250 m2
Structure & size: steel reinforced concrete structure, five stories above ground

About OMRON Corporation

Headquartered in Kyoto, Japan, OMRON Corporation is a global leader in the field of automation. Established in 1933, and headed by President Yoshihito Yamada, OMRON has more than 37,000 employees in over 35 countries working to provide products and services to customers in a variety of fields including industrial automation, electronic components, social systems, and healthcare. The company has five regional head offices in Kyoto (Japan), Singapore (Asia Pacific), Shanghai (Greater China), Amsterdam (Europe, Africa, and the Middle East), and Chicago (the Americas). For more information, visit OMRON's website: https://www.omron.com/

Press inquiries:: Arihiro Yokota
Corporate Communications Department
OMRON Corporation
Tel: +81-75-344-7175
E-mail: arihiro_yokota@omron.co.jp

Investment of JPY10B to Boost LCD Backlight Business- Factory in Mishima opens to reinforce technology development and automated production -