Kyocera to position B'lore among top R&D centres

US-based Kyocera, which specialises in CDMA handsets for the telecommunications sector, intends to position Bangalore among its global centres for innovation in product design and R&D.

Kyocera Wireless India (KWI), the Bangalore-based engineering development facility of Kyocera Wireless Corp (KWC), will also increase its contribution to the company's global telecommunication business.

According to company officials, KWI is set to ramp up its operations to support Kyocera's expanding technology portfolio, product complexity and new requirements in the wireless space. The company aims to strengthen its talent base by adding 300 more professionals by the end of 2008.

KWI, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Kyocera Wireless Corp (KWC), commenced its operations in 2003 with a staff of 30. At present, KWI is engaged in the development of CDMA wireless handsets. "KWI established its prowess as a product development company by engineering a complete phone from India within 30 months of its inception," Rodney N Lanthorne, Kyocera Wireless Corp President and Chairman of the Board, said.

According to him, the Bangalore centre is playing a key role in the development of industry-leading technologies, including near-field communications (NFC), biometric-sensor integrated solutions for mobile commerce (m-commerce), dual-mode handsets that switch seamlessly between WiFi and CDMA networks, and a commercial wireless broadband network system beyond 3G.

"We at Kyocera like to challenge the frontiers of wireless communication and consumer lifestyle markets. India possesses great technical competence and a tremendous talent pool to help power our global vision. We will leverage this potential and continue to deliver pioneering solutions in emerging communication technologies," Lanthorne added.

Other than Bangalore, Kyocera's R&D centres are located in Yokohama, Japan and San Diego in the US.

Samartha Raghava Nagabhushanam, KWI's managing director, said KWI was developing CDMA handsets for the North American and Japanese Markets. "We are also working on base-station and mobile station development for next-generation wireless broadband technologies beyond 3G, such as iBurst, next-generation PHS and WiMax are also being developed here," he added.

The Bangalore centre is also focusing on new technologies in the wireless space like MIMO, smart antennas, SDMA, m-commerce, NFC and biometric sensors.

"KWI has also nurtured new engineering disciplines specific to phone development that include systems engineering, human-factors engineering, industrial design, electro-mechanical engineering, regulatory conformance, manufacturing engineering and component engineering," he said.

KWI has also set-up a customer care organisation with a network of 224 authorised service centres across India. KWI also has a full-fledged Level 4 service centre in Bangalore where component level repairs of CDMA phones are performed.