Omron Corp., a Kyoto-based provider of automation, sensing and control technologies, announced today that it will acquire NHK Spring Co. Ltd.'s fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) optical coupler business. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The business includes the component microfabrication and film deposition technologies required to produce high-performance quartz optical waveguides (an element that branches optical power), as well as the development, manufacture and sale of optical coupler modules that incorporate these waveguides.

For fiscal 2005, NHK Spring of Yokohama, Japan, had total sales of 1.3 billion yen (about $11 million) in fiscal 2005. Omron said it intends to combine NHK Spring's quartz optical waveguide technology with its own stacked polymer optical waveguide technology and expand its business in the FTTH optical coupler market. The FTTH market is expanding rapidly in Japan and the US, and future growth is expected to extend into Europe and Asia, Omron said.

This agreement is also expected to help stimulate sales of Omron's optical switches and CWDM mux/demux modules, the company said.

As a result of the acquisition, Omron forecasts that its optical communications component business sales will be approximately 2 billion yen (about $17 million) for fiscal 2006. Omron said it is now finalizing the details with NHK Spring, and the acquisition is scheduled to take effect on Nov. 1.

For more information, visit: www.omron.com