Annual Production Capacity for Solar Cells Expanded to 500 MW, World's Highest
To meet burgeoning demand in Japan and internationally, Sharp added a new production line for solar cells at its Katsuragi Plant (Nara Prefecture) to increase annual production capacity by 85 MW (megawatts). As a result, production capacity at the Katsuragi Plant expanded to 500 MW annually, the world's highest. Sharp's solar cell production capacity in 2005 was the world's highest for the sixth year in a row, and Sharp was highly rated as a leading environmental company.
Total Production of "Kameyama Brand" AQUOS LCD TVs Tops One Million Units
"Kameyama brand" AQUOS LCD TVs reached total production of one million units in the 14 months since initial shipments first began in 2004. Sharp's LCD TVs are appreciated as the "Kameyama brand" born in Japan.
Introduces 65V-Inch Digital Full-HD LCD TV, World's Largest*
The 65V-inch AQUOS, the world's largest* LCD TV, attracted a great deal of attention by showing that super-large screens sizes, which had been the stronghold of PDP displays up to now, had also become the domain of LCDs. This model features technologies designed to provide high image quality: a full-HD LCD panel (1,920H x 1,080V pixels) and a newly developed four-wavelength backlight system that enables more vivid color reproduction of reds closer to the original color than previously possible.
- * As of June 3, 2005 for digital HD LCD TVs at that time.
Development of Electronic Calculator Recognized as an IEEE Milestone
The electronic desktop calculator first introduced to the world by Sharp was recognized with a prestigious IEEE Milestone from the IEEE, a worldwide electrical and electronics engineering society. The IEEE Milestone program honors revolutionary achievements in the electrical/electronics field, and Sharp's electronic calculator was the first Japanese IT device to be recognized with such an honor since the award was established in 1983.
This recognition gave high marks to Sharp for its innovative work in reducing the size and power consumption of the desktop electronic calculator over the years from 1964 to 1973. Sharp introduced the world's first all-transistor/diode desktop calculator, the CS-10A in 1964. This was followed by the world's first development of solid-state circuitry for consumer use and applying it to IC/LSI electronic calculators that dramatically reduced the component count (CS-16A in 1967, and QT-8D in 1969). Sharp then introduced the pocketsize LCD electronic calculator, the first in the world to use an LCD device and CMOS-based IC (EL-805 in 1973). These products evolved into compact information devices for personal use, and contributed to the widespread adoption and use around the globe of electronic calculators.