R&D Spirits
Exploring the Possibilities of NTT Technologies
Beyond the Framework of Communications
Dr. Kimiyoshi Yamasaki
Chief Producer
Department III, NTT †NTT’s Department III, which aims to generate new business for NTT Group companies, hasbeen applying NTT’s Comprehensive Commercialization Functions since their introduction in
July 2003. Among the 11 teams that are now active in this system, Dr. Kimiyoshi Yamasaki,
Chief Producer, leads the Innovative Device Team and the Strategic Business Creation Team.
As a bridge builder between R&D and business, what are his goals and what possibilities does
he think lie behind NTT R&D? To get the answers to these and other questions, we asked Dr.
Yamasaki to tell us about his R&D philosophy based on his personal experiences and his future
outlook for NTT R&D.

Engaged in diverse projects as a bridgebuilder between R&D and business—Dr. Yamasaki, could you first tell us about your current duties.
A “chief producer” works to find ways of “outputting” the research results of NTT Laboratories.
That is to say, he bridges the gap between R&D andproducts. In my role as a chief producer, I am incharge of the Innovative Device Team and the Strategic Business Creation Team, which are two of the 11
teams in applying the Comprehensive Commercialization Functions introduced by NTT in July 2003.
First, let me tell you about the Innovative Device
Team. Although part of our work here involves electronic devices, our main target is optical components.
As you know, NTT is now in the process of converting the subscriber system to optical fiber, and the goalis 30 million optical subscribers by 2010. This, however, will require the provision of highly reliable andinexpensive optical devices. At the same time, converting the subscriber system to optical fiber will
increase the amount of traffic on the network backbone, but unlike past networks, it is not easy to predict traffic trends on the Internet. Therefore, there† Present address: Photonics Business GroupNTT Electronics Corporation
Machida-shi, 194-0004 Japan

6

must be enough flexibility to allow network facilities
to be moved or added as the need arises after the network has been constructed. The role of the Innovative
Device Team is to search out and develop productsthat can meet these needs. As for the Strategic Business Creation Team, its job is to expand the businessdomain of the entire NTT Group by selecting promising themes from core technologies coming out of
NTT R&D and using them to create completely newlines of business.
—What specific themes are your teams involved withat this time?
The Innovative Device and Strategic Business Creation Teams are now working on about 30 proposals
in all. For example, the Innovative Device Team is
exploring ways of reducing the size and lowering thecost of optical splitters for the access network andoptical transceivers for optical network units(ONUs). They are also working to improve opticalswitch chips and wavelength-multiplexing arrayedwaveguide gratings (AWGs) for reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexers (R-OADMs) with the aimof making nodes and intra-prefecture networks more
flexible (Fig. 1). The Strategic Business Creation
Team is also working on many projects. These
include “HORN,” a speech synthesis system capableof expressing emotions and nuances; “RedTacton,” asystem for communicating information through the
NTT Technical Review

R&D Spirits

human body; “Voice Ubique,” an ultrasmall wirelesstransceiver for short-range communications with nodelay; “Digital Cinema,” a movie distribution system;
and “Mobile Digital Watermarks,” a picture-to-Internet link platform using watermarks embedded in pictures (Fig. 2).
—As a producer, what kind of things are you concerned with?
I have two main concerns. The first is how to makethe things that I manage easier to understand. For
example, the results of this work that we call R&D
can sometimes be difficult to comprehend. That’s
because some things that are extremely interestingfrom a scientific point of view are not necessarily
useful in the real world and because the return on
R&D investment is not easily quantified. To resolve
this problem, I have established a basic guideline thatsays that we must achieve sales of five times thedevelopment cost within a period of three years. This
gives me a better understanding of the investment
return for the R&D that I manage, and it also helps togive researchers a sense of accomplishment in thework that they do. In principle, development continues if this level of return could be achieved and is
temporarily halted if not. Thus, by requiring that

results be achieved in a relatively short period of timerather than a span of 10 or 20 years, we can obtain aclear understanding of investment return and makeresearchers feel more productive and motivated. Of
course, the failure to satisfy this guideline does notmean that a researcher’s next challenge will be rejected. Some people have said that three years is simply
too short. In truth, more than a few technologies inthe device research field did not bloom until at least
20 years of basic research had been conducted—
research that appeared, at the time, to have no end insight. With this in mind, there has been a slightincrease in the number of themes that have been
allowed slightly longer investment recovery periods,
say five years.
My other concern is how to expand our markets tofields outside NTT. Although the work that we do isbasically research and development for the sake ofNTT business, expanding outside NTT’s traditional
field of communications may reveal technologies or
products with the potential of even bigger markets.
One example is the replacement of traffic-signal
lamps with light emitting diodes. For this reason, weare devoting one-fourth of our resources to the Innovative Device Team for expanding into new markets.
However, lest we expand haphazardly without a senseof direction, we have narrowed down our efforts here

Core network

WDM transmission
equipment

OXC

AWG

Optical switch
chip

Metro network
Node equipment(OADM)

R-OADM
Optical transceiverfor OLT use

R-OADM
sub-board

Access network
Optical splitter

Optical transceiverfor ONU use

OLT: optical line terminal
OXC: optical cross connect

Fig. 1. Optical devices for network support.

Vol. 3 No. 7 July 2005

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R&D Spirits

The goal is to expand the business domain of the entire NTT Group by examining core technologies born out of R&D andselecting themes that show promise for creating new businesses not limited to telecommunications.
Core
technologies
Business plan
• Theme discovery• Business feasibility
assessment
Alliance• Business-partner
development

Promotion• Fast acquisitionof users• PR strategy

Customer development(creation)
HORN
Business-development
schemeEntrepreneurial spirit

RedTacton

Mobile Digital Watermarks

Voice Ubique
Digital Cinema

Fig. 2. Business creation activities.

to two fields: “medical care and biotechnology” and“sensing and the environment” (Fig. 3).

Promoting borderless alliances with various
industries and universities—In research to date, what kind of response have you
received from both inside and outside Japan?
Well, in terms of actual results, the 10-Gbit/s highspeed IC that I developed has come to be used in mostinternational communication networks interconnecting Japan with North America, Australia, and Asia,and in those connecting Europe and the UnitedStates. This device has also found considerable use inJapanese and American domestic networks. In fact, at
one time, it had held a world-wide share of at least
90% for ICs of this type. But I began research on thisdevice in 1980, and it wasn’t until 1999 that it finallybecame a major component. That felt like a long time
to me. There were times when I thought that I should
just bring an end to the whole thing and leave theresearch where it stood.
—Are you forming any alliances with outside
research institutions or enterprises?
Yes, in terms of private enterprises, we are tying up
8with a number of manufacturers and trading companies here in Japan and North America, and we arealso forming partnerships with universities in the
public sector.
—Could you give us some specific examples of
expanding into new services or forming alliances?
Yes. First, we have formed an alliance with Yoshimoto Kogyo, a major entertainment company inJapan. Using the HORN speech synthesis system that
I mentioned earlier, we are now in the process ofdeveloping a “ring-tune” type of delivery service that
notifies a mobile-phone user of an incoming call byhaving his/her name called out in the voice of a showbusiness personality. Next, we are applying Voice
Ubique, the ultrasmall wireless transceiver that I alsomentioned, in a service that provides audio commentary on works of art at the Chuya Nakahara Memorial Museum in Yamaguchi prefecture. Also, though
it’s not yet an actual service, we are solidifying partnerships with the Hollywood movie industry to promote our Digital Cinema system. And back in February of this year, when we issued extensive news
releases about our RedTacton human-body transmission system and announced a call for partners to further develop the product, we were approached bymore than 100 companies and organizations. ThereNTT Technical Review

R&D Spirits

Development and application
target of new-wavelength
laser light sources

Development andapplication targetof broadband (SLD)
light sources

Development andapplication targetof over-2-µm laser
light sources

OrangeYellow-green
Green
Order-madewavelengths

Light sources forcommunications

Application fields of light sources Transition to longfor communications
wavelengths
Transition tobroadband

Light sources for
OCT (formedical measurements
ophthalmology)
and analysis
FluorescentproteinLight sources forbiotechnology
measurements
Visualization ofcell functions
Light sources
for gas sensors
0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

Measurement ofblood sugar level

GlucoseOCT (for skin andendoscope use)
HF

Bacteria
H. pylori bacterium
HCl

H2O

Detection of
H. pylori

NH3

CH4 H2O

CO2

CO

H2O

SO2 NO2
HBr
1.2

1.4

1.6
1.8
2.0
Wavelength (µm)

N2O
2.2

2.4

2.6

2.8

3.0~

OCT: optical coherence tomography
SLD: super luminescent diodeFig. 3. Developing new application areas for optical devices: biotechnology/medical measurements and gas sensors.

are still other themes and products that we are making progress with, but unfortunately, they are not yetat the stage where I can talk freely about them. But I
think you’ll be hearing about them in the near future.

The continuous pursuit of new ideas—Dr. Yamasaki, you have been involved with a wide
range of technical areas, but could you tell us what
your original specialty was?
During my university days, I researched high-speedtransistors made on gallium arsenide (GaAs). After
entering NTT in 1980 with a doctorate in electronicengineering, this continued to be my basic research
theme. In fact, I spent about 80% of the next 20 years
or so at NTT Laboratories working on the development of commercial high-speed GaAs devices.
—Please tell us about specific research themes thatyou have worked on in the past and the results thatyou have achieved.
My first project after entering NTT was the development of high-capacity LSI memories. At that time,
NTT was playing a role in Japan’s development of
LSI memories, and our goal was to achieve commerVol. 3 No. 7 July 2005

cial LSI memories with the world’s largest capacity
using gallium arsenide instead of silicon, which was
felt to have limitations. However, it wasn’t long
before NTT withdrew from memory development forvarious reasons, and as a result, research in this areacame to a halt. This was a terrible setback for me, butduring the course of this research, I came to invent
and apply a transistor-fabrication method having
excellent conformability.
Then, after about one year looking for a new direction, I finally decided on medium-scale, ultrahighspeed ICs for optical communications as my main
target and I got right to work. In 1992, after committing considerable resources, we made the world’s
fastest IC at 10 Gbit/s. Today, in 2005, 10-Gbit/s ICs
are the most widely used devices in the NTT backbone network, but at that time, they represented a
breakthrough in transmission speed. The use of thisdevice also spread beyond NTT during the IT procurement boom that began in 1998. Around this time,
I also became involved in research to miniaturizemonolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs)
for 4-, 5-, and 6-GHz fixed microwave repeaters.
These devices are also currently being used in NTT’s
microwave backbone network.
Actually, though I have basically been involved in
GaAs device research from the very beginning. There9

R&D Spirits

was a period of about four years that I was away fromthis area. In 1990 and 1991, I worked at the NTT
Research and Development Headquarters, in a management role, where I received a comprehensive viewof NTT research. And during the following two years,
I was involved in research of optical switching andinterconnections. Why would I do something completely different from my field of specialty? Well, I
began to realize that for the last ten years I had only
been active in the world of small components and hadreceived no exposure to NTT as a whole, much lessthe outside world. It was therefore important that I
obtain some work experience in a department where
I could get an extensive view of the research process
and in a research area that was applying the results ofmy original research work. This turned out to be avery beneficial experience. I then returned to device
research, but once it was decided that the 10-Gbit/s
ICs and modules would be heavily marketed, I moved
on to NTT Electronics in 1999 to take charge of thateffort. Finally, in July 2003, I took on my present
position with the launch of the Comprehensive Commercialization Functions.
—What was the biggest factor behind the great success of NTT’s high-speed ICs?
I think it was that we believed in ourselves and targeted a field that no one else was looking at. During
the time that we were researching high-speed GaAs
ICs, many companies and researchers throughout theworld were devoting their efforts to power amplifiers
for cell phones. As a result, when it became known
around 1998 that various carriers would be using bit
rates of 10 Gbit/s for their backbone networks, wewere the only research institution in the world that
had something that could meet this need. Around1990, when we were struggling with 10-Gbit/s
research, the usual line speed in NTT circuits was 600
Mbit/s, and we received some criticism to the effectthat we were wasting our time setting such high specifications. Nevertheless, we were convinced that the
10-Gbit/s era was coming and we simply continued
with our research. At last, 1998 brought us vindication, but to be honest, I actually expected the 10Gbit/s era to arrive sooner—1998 was a bit late.
—What motivates you to be involved in R&D activities?

able component to networks. I have always aimed tocreate as many things as possible that could play a
new role in both technical and practical terms. Thisjob of being a producer is therefore right up my alley,
I believe.
—What do you find particularly interesting about
being a producer?
Finding supporters in unexpected places. There arepeople or companies that have not been associatedwith NTT in the past but that nevertheless take astrong liking to our technology and say “Let’s do it
together” with a look of excitement in their eyes. A
typical example would be representatives of the Hollywood movie industry with which we are forming
alliances to promote Digital Cinema as I mentioned.
Encountering such support is very satisfying, and weare doing as much as we can to form alliances of thistype. Of course, increasing sales as a result of such analliance would be even more satisfying.

Making an even greater impact with NTT
technology—Dr. Yamasaki, what are your plans for the future?
I would like to give society as many things as possible that can be easily used by anyone. One of the
fruits of my research, the 10-Gbit/s device, is being
used in telecommunication networks around theworld and is providing many benefits to people’s
lives. Unfortunately, it is not something that people
can easily notice and appreciate. I would therefore
also like to create things that are used frequently ineveryday life and that the ordinary consumer can purchase, and that I can develop big markets for.
—What is your dream as a technical researcher?
I think that NTT technology should be able to havean even greater impact on the world. I think that itshould be applied to a diverse array of fields aboveand beyond NTT’s traditional field of communications. And I believe that it has the potential to produce
genuine profits. That is something that I would love
to demonstrate. In this sense, I am quite passionate
about my work as a chief producer.
—What is your personal view of NTT Laboratories?

One thing is the chance to be creative. I have always
wanted to create something using a new idea. For
example, I might incorporate a new idea into the waythat a device is made in order to achieve a very stablemanufacturing process, or I might apply a new idea toa mediocre memory device to make it an indispens10

It’s a very understanding and tolerant research institution. I have spent 25 years in research activities at
NTT Laboratories, and the freedom that was given to
me in my work made that a very enjoyable time forme. New proposals that I made or new challenges thatNTT Technical Review

R&D Spirits

I wanted to take on were always met in a positive way
and budgeted as needed. And that’s not all. To give a
research seed that I had planted time to sprout, mywork was looked at with a relatively long view. Without this kind of understanding, my research would
have amounted to nothing. I truly feel lucky to haveentered NTT Laboratories. I don’t believe that there
are any other private research institutions today withsuch a depth of understanding. I feel that one role ofus veterans here is to maintain and convey this positive quality of NTT Laboratories.
—Please give us a message for young researchers.
Certainly. Based on personal experience, I would
like you to pursue R&D with a strong awareness ofcustomer needs. To achieve something that no one hasdone before, it is imperative that you approach it withenthusiasm and focus. However, it is not enough tosimply invent or create something. It will be difficult
to develop a market for your research achievementson conviction alone if there are no existing needs. In
other words, it is equally important to research anddevelop technology and services with the customer oruser in mind. It is essential that you give importanceto what you believe in while at the same time developing a world view with a broad outlook. I myself
gave no thought to the customer during the time that
I researched the devices for memory LSIs. Believing
only in my own theories, I conducted research with theconviction that “this device, being the amazing thingthat it is, cannot help but find widespread use.” Well,in the end, my devices were well received, but that was
only after many twists and turns. Perhaps I was justlucky. I believe that keeping the customer and user inmind will give you a greater chance at R&D success.
But please don’t misunderstand me. Simply thinking about the customer or user during R&D without
actual experiences is not going to lead to much. To all
young researchers, I emphasize that a life spent onlyin the research laboratory is not going to work. I recommend that you also get out into the world andexperience the viewpoints of manufacturers and users
firsthand. That is the sure way to grow as a researcher.
Today’s research environment is much more open
than it was in my time, so I urge you to take advantage of the opportunities given you and train yourself
well in various areas. This does not mean that yourexperiences should be aimless. Take on serious challenges for which failure could mean, for example, thedamage of your business unit. The NTT Group is ahuge enterprise, and while it might be thought of as
rigid for that reason, in truth, it can be a very challenging environment. I would like to see you become
top-notch researchers by taking advantage of what
this great enterprise has to offer.
Vol. 3 No. 7 July 2005

Interviewee profile■ Career highlights
Kimiyoshi Yamasaki received the B.E., M.E., andPh.D. degrees in electronicengineering from the University of Tokyo, Tokyo in 1975,
1977, and 1980, respectively.
In 1980 he joined the Electrical Communication Laboratories of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Public Corporation (now NTT). From 1980 to 1987, he wasengaged in R&D of GaAs high-speed device andprocess technologies. He invented a novel self-aligned
technology, called self-aligned implantation for n+layer technology (SAINT), which was suitable forhigh-speed ICs as well as monolithic microwave ICs(MMICs). From 1987 to 1988, he spent a year at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, as a Visiting Scientist,
where he researched ballistic electron devices. In
1991–1992, he was engaged in research on ATM
switching systems with optical interconnection. From1993 to 1997, he was responsible for the developmentof advanced GaAs IC technology for ultrahigh-speed
optical fiber communication systems and three-dimensional MMICs. From 1997 to 1999, he was the Executive Manager of the High-Speed Devices and Technology Laboratory at NTT Photonics Laboratories,
where he led research on InP-based ultrahigh-speed
ICs and photodetectors. From 1999–2003, he worked
at NTT Electronics Corporation, where he was responsible for the business of high-speed modules for 10Gbit/s submarine as well as terrestrial optical fiber
communication systems. Then he directed the ProductDevelopment Center for optical and electrical components. Since 2003, he has been Chief Producer of theInnovative Device Team and Strategic Business Creation Team at Department III (R&D Strategy Department) of NTT. He served as Overseas Advisor for theIEEE GaAs IC Symposium from 1996–1999 and as
General Secretary for the 1998 International Symposium on Compound Semiconductors. He is a memberof IEEE, the Japan Society of Applied Physics, and theInstitute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers of Japan.

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