HORIBA Technology Center Opens in Silicon Valley

HORIBA Ltd has established a new development base, the "HORIBA Technology Center" in Silicon Valley, Santa Clara, California, following the Group's concerted efforts to meet the needs of the American hi-tech market for products such as semiconductors and biotechnology.

With the objective of conducting joint-development with hi-tech corporate clients and offering proposals for solutions, the center will be set up in this area, home to the world's frontier technologies. It is complete with laboratories and clean rooms that are furnished with the latest equipment from the Group companies.

Initially, a group of 10 engineers from Japan and the US will work together in the home territory of large semiconductor device/equipment manufacturers, in order to develop fluid controlling devices and vacuum analyzing devices to be loaded into semiconductor producing equipment.

The initial investment, including in plants and equipment, will amount to approximately 400 million yens and the building will be one-story above the ground, with an approximate gross floor area of 1,900m².

Horiba established its first overseas office in the U.S. (in California) in 1970, starting with the sale of measuring devices for automotive exhaustion emissions in the US. Expansion to Silicon Valley followed with the opening of an office aiming to sell semiconductor measuring devices in 1984. In 1991, the US office of HORIBA STEC Co. Ltd joined and in 1998, HORIBA/STEC Inc. was formed by the merger of the two companies in order to reinforce the group's semiconductor business.