Sojitz Machinery Corporation (Head office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President: Satoshi Nagakubo), a machinery trading company wholly owned by Sojitz Corporation, has formed a comprehensive business alliance with the fine particle production technology venture company Beryu Co., Ltd. (Head office: Taisho-ku, Osaka; President: Mitsuru Nakano).

Sojitz Machinery has acquired from Beryu the exclusive license for patents relating to mixing equipment and emulsifying/dispersion/combining equipment that enable the processing of various materials into nano-size particles, and will undertake exclusive production and sales of the said equipment.  Beryu will undertake basic designs and development of the equipment as well as material development testing requested by potential equipment customers.

The demand for fine particles produced through material emulsification, dispersion and composite processes is rapidly expanding over a wide range of fields for use in such things as color toner for multi-function peripherals and copiers, cellular phone and automobile batteries, MLCC (Multi-layer ceramic capacitors), liquid crystal materials and pharmaceuticals.  Various manufacturers are considering developing new materials by the equipment that would dramatically improve the performance of their products.  

Sojitz Machinery has aggressively embarked on sales activities, targeting manufacturers in areas such as electronic components, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and office equipment, and aims to achieve sales of approximately ¥ 3 billion (US$ 25 million) in three years time.  Further, it will conduct sales activities overseas, via the Sojitz Group network. 

Reference

Features of patented Beryu technologies

(1)	Pressure and temperature can be controlled at will in accordance with the materials processed and pressure is gradually reduced to produce fine particles. Compared with conventional cavitation-driven atomization technology which discharges pressure at once, our process discharges it to the atmosphere gradually at will. Thus, high-quality fine particles with targeted diameters can be produced at the nano-level with sharp particle-size distribution and elimination of the following classification process.
(2)	Since the energy supplied (pressure and temperature) is utilized for atomization in an efficient manner, damage to the equipment caused by cavitation is tremendously  reduced, as is contamination with foreign particles.  As a result, energy loss is minimal and yield is high.
(3)	The volume of surface-active agent required for atomization can be reduced, which enables shifting from petroleum solvent to water soluble solvent, thereby significantly reducing  load on liquid-waste treatment facilities.
(4)	The advantages described above will contribute not only to reduced total capital investments, but also greatly to global environmental protection.

 

 

Outline of Beryu Co., Ltd.

President	Mitsuru Nakano
Address	Technoseeds Izumio, 6-2-29 Izumio, Taisho-ku, Osaka-shi
Establishment	December 1996
Capital	15 million yen
Business description	Development and production of super high pressure homogenizerCosmetic ingredient processing, production and sale of cosmetics