Japan's Kyocera Technology awarded prize for world's smallest crystal units

Kyocera Corporation has announced that the company has received the 42nd Inoue Harushige Prize for developing ultra-small quartz crystal units for smartphones, wearable devices and innovative IoT solutions.

The crystal units, which apply plasma CVM technology*1, were developed by Kyocera and Dr. Kazuya Yamamura, a professor at Osaka University. The 42nd award ceremony took place on July 25, 2017.

Each year the Inoue Harushige Prize is awarded to researchers and corporations for outstanding innovations that have contributed to science, technology and the economy in Japan. One of the award criteria is technology that was developed and commercialized by corporations based on original research by universities and research institutions.

Kyocera successfully developed ultra-high-precision quartz wafers by combining the unique technology of Kyocera piezoelectric analysis and the plasma CVM technology developed by Dr. Yamamura. From the combination of these unique technologies, Kyocera has realized a photolithographic process with integrated wafer level production.

Based on this photolithography technology, Kyocera was able to achieve the world's smallest quartz crystal*2 while still maintaining excellent performance. The business-academia collaboration of Kyocera and Dr. Yamamura was highly evaluated for its impact on further miniaturization in the smartphone, wearable device as well as hearing aid and capsule medical device industries.

Kyocera will accelerate the development of low-frequency crystal units for automotive applications, high-frequency crystal units for wireless base stations, and high-precision oscillators utilizing this technology. The technology will also support the growth of 5G, Advanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS) and IoT markets.