|
By Ike Suarez, Correspondent
Hitachi Global Storage Technologies has announced the launching
of its Integrated University Program to spur R&D in Philippine
universities, as part of its strategy as well as positioning the
country as a center where the Japanese tech giant could further
refine breakthrough concepts in slider technology developed in their
laboratories in San Jose, California and Okinawa, Japan.
A slider is a tiny magnetic head playing
critical roles in hard disk drive performance as they read and write
the data stored in these drives. The slider is a highly complex
component of a computer’s hard drive and can be considered a form
of nanotechnology.
Hitachi Global Storage Technologies revealed the
program at a press briefing late last week at the Shangri-La Hotel
in Makati City.
An initial donation totaling $3 million worth of
equipment to the University of the Philippines and the Ateneo de
Manila University for use in their laboratories kicked off the
program. The equipment donation consisted of multi-axes robots,
precision states, and servo motor control and vision systems, and
interferometry, microscopy, and nano measurement tools.
Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Philippines
President Dr. Tuan Tran in his address at the launch said that
besides R&D projects on slider technology, these institutions
would be free to use the instruments for whatever R&D projects
they wished to undertake.
In March 2007, Hitachi GST had shifted the focus
of its Philippine operations in Biñan, Laguna, from the
manufacturing hard disk drives for all kinds of computers to the
production of sliders. A total of 276 million of these sliders were
locally produced in 2007; 20 percent of Hitachi’s global
production. By 2010, sliders output in the country will reach 85
percent of global production according to Hitachi.
To remain competitive, Hitachi has done
continuous R&D on slider technology , particularly to improve
their energy efficiency, shock tolerance and shock capacity. Such
R&D done initially in their Silicon Valley and Okinawa
laboratories would now be done in Philippine universities.
Tran said the Integrated University Program
would also furnish research grants in various engineering
disciplines, chemistry, physics, computer science, statistics and
new materials. Among the beneficiaries would be UP Ateneo, De la
Salle University, Mapua Institute of Technology, Polytechnic
University of the Philippines, and University of Santo Tomas.
Tran did not give out financial details. He
added that their Laguna operations would also give on the job
training to students, in the fields of robotics, meterology or the
science of precision measurements, and design.
Hitachi, along with UP and Ateneo, are now
drawing up an intellectual property agreement with regard to revenue
sharing earned from R&D projects done with the donated
equipment, according to a company spokesman.
In the Philippine, Hitachi GST has grown to 5000
employees in the Philippines since 1994.
|
