Ube Material Industries and Nippon Tungsten Enter MgO Sputtering Target Business

Ube Material Industries and Nippon Tungsten announced on 11 September the firms co-developed sputtering target of magnesium oxide with 99.999% (5N) high purity and 99.4% high density. The firms will sell the product mainly for hard disc drives (HDDs) with an initial capacity at 1,000 targets per annum.The product quality was evaluated by Canon ANELVA, Japanese sputtering targeting equipment maker, and other HDD makers for HDD magnetic heads. Ube Material Industries and Nippon Tungsten can start commercial shipment of magnetic oxide sputtering targets.The product can be also used for MRAM (magnetic random access memory). The current demand is from research and development usages but the market growth is expected for next-generation large capacity MRAM. Ube Material Industries and Nippon Tungsten already finished development of high grade sputtering targets for MRAM. They aim to enter magnesium oxide sputtering target business in cooperation.