Overseas Trends

Report on the 12th Micromachine Summit“Micro/nano technologies at Mitsubishi ElectricCorporation”.

The 12th Micromachine Summit was held over 3days, from April 27 to 29, 2006, at the yellow-sandhazed Jiu Hua Spa & Resort on the outskirts of Beijing,
China.

Tours of the beautifully illuminated Great Wall andTiananmen Square were arranged for the evenings
after the sessions concluded on both days, providing
opportunities for participants to deepen friendships
and rounding out two highly productive days.

The summit was hosted by Tsinghua University andwas attended by 88 delegates and observers from 17
countries and regions: Australia, Canada, China,France, Germany, India, Japan, the Republic of Korea,
Singapore, Switzerland, Taiwan, the United Kingdom,
the United States, the Benelux countries (Belgium, theNetherlands, Luxembourg), the EU, the Mediterranean
region (Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece), and the Nordiccountries (Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland).
Japan was represented by a delegation of 16 – thelargest ever for a summit held overseas – led byProfessor Isao Shimoyama of the University of Tokyoas Chief Delegate.

A technology tour was held on April 29. The tour
visited Tsinghua University and a bioventure businesssupported by Tsinghua University, Capital Biochip
Corporation, ending the summit on a successful note.
The 13th Micromachine Summit is to be held from
April 26 to 28 next year in Venice, Italy and Korea,
Canada, the United Kingdom, and India have all
expressed a desire to host summits in the future. High
expectations are held for the summit as a place forinternational exchange regarding MEMS andnanotechnology, and I believe we should fully utilize itas such.

Held over two days, April 27 and 28, the summit
conference was chaired by Prof. Zhaoying Zhou ofTsinghua University. Altogether, an impressive 54
presentations were made in the 6 sessions: (1)Country/Region Review; (2) Strategy & Cooperation;(3) Infrastructures & Education; (4) Market,
Industrialization & Standardization; (5) To NanoTechnology; and (6) Innovative Technology.
Japan made five presentations. The content of eachand every one of these was excellent and received
high praise from delegates of other countries; having
acted as secretariat for the summit for a long time
now, I am sure that there was renewed awarenessamong participating countries of Japan’s position. InSession 1, Professor Shimoyama gave an outline of theIntegrated MEMS Technology Development Project,which began this year, in his presentation entitled“Fine MEMS – upcoming MEMS project”. In Session 4,
Micromachine Center Executive Director Keiichi
Aoyagi described the activities of the MEMS Industry
Forum, which was established in April this year, in apresentation entitled “Towards advancement of MEMS
industry in Japan”. In Session 5, various businesses
representatives described their companies’ activities
regarding MEMS and nanotechnology: Mr. Masaaki
Terada, Director and Senior Executive Managing
Officer of Olympus Corporation, spoke on “Nano-Bio
MEMS technology for Medical Application”; KoichiImanaka, Managing Officer and Senior General
Manager of Research & Development H.Q. of Omron
Corporation, spoke on “Micro and nano technology inJapan - example of OMRON Corporation–”; andKazuhiko Tsutsumi, Manager of Imaging Technology,
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation Advanced Technology
Research and Development Center, spoke about

Summit Participants: in front of the summit venue,
the Jiu Hua Spa & Resort

Japan’s Chief Delegate: Presentation by Professor
Isao Shimoyama of the University of Tokyo

http://www.mmc.or.jp/kokusai/summit/summit.html

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