News

Mitsubishi Materials Corporation ("MMC") has invested in Visban Corporation ("Visban"), a start-up company working on next-generation millimeter wave networks. The investment was made through the MMC Innovation Investment Limited Partnership (*1).

Visban is a developer of low-cost, high-reliability millimeter wave network devices. Millimeter wave communications have the advantage of high-speed transmission of large amounts of data and the capability to connect many devices simultaneously thanks to the wide bandwidth. In addition, this communication system can provide a less congested communication environment by using a higher frequency band, which can dramatically improve communication speed in certain areas.
In addition to investing in Visban, MMC aims to make a significant contribution to the spread and expansion of 5G/6G communications by applying its strengths in materials required for microcircuit formation, dissimilar material bonding technology and its evaluation technology through collaboration with Visban.

We as the MMC Group have set "For people, society and the earth, circulating resources for a sustainable future" as Our Commitment. We will continue to implement various initiatives to realize Our Commitment through the provision of non-ferrous metal materials and high value-added products.

(*1)

A corporate venture fund jointly established in March 2019 by MMC and JMTC Capital G.K., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Japan Material Technologies Corporation, to invest in venture companies with material technologies.

About Visban

Millimeter wave communications require the installation of many base stations due to issues including their short communication range, signal blockage by walls, windows and trees and attenuation by fog and hydrometeors, which poses the problem of huge infrastructure development costs. The glass substrate-based smart repeaters being developed by Visban improve sensitivity and reduce loss using high-precision antenna structures formed on a glass substrate. In addition, ICs and other components are also mounted on the glass substrate using heterogeneous integration technology, resulting in the achievement of lower costs for infrastructure development. Furthermore, including a software-based AI-powered mesh network controller (*2) can expand millimeter wave coverage and eliminate dead spots in millimeter wave communication networks. This technology will enable the high-speed, low-latency wireless communications required for technologies such as VR/AR, 8K high-resolution video and self-driving vehicles.

Overview of Visban

(*2)

A control device that autonomously interconnects multiple devices to achieve efficient and reliable data transmission. In a mesh network, each device can communicate directly with every other device, increasing the resilience and scalability of the entire network.