On February 22, Fujitsu Limited announced that Shimane Fujitsu Limited, which manufactures personal computers for the Fujitsu Group, passed the significant manufacturing milestone of 20 million computers. 

Shimane Fujitsu started operations on October 1, 1990 as a desktop computer manufacturing plant. In 1995, desktop computer production was transferred to Fujitsu Isotec Limited, and Shimane Fujitsu currently manufactures notebook computers, including LifeBook notebooks and Stylistic tablet computers, bringing outstanding “Made in Japan” products directly to international markets. 

While many of Japan’s computer manufacturers have moved manufacturing to outside contractors in foreign countries to reduce costs, Fujitsu continues to manufacture its high-quality notebook computers in Japan and handles its computers’ creation in-house, from the initial design of the circuit boards to manufacturing and final assembly, even tailoring solutions to meet customer needs. 

Since the introduction of the Toyota Production System in 2005, Shimane Fujitsu has shortened lead times, improved operations management, and reduced costs while maintaining quality, enabling the company to quickly launch new models in response to customer requirements. 

In August 2000, Shimane Fujitsu passed the 5-million milestone, and passed the 10-million mark in June 2003. On February 22, the company produced and shipped its 20 millionth computer, marking the occasion with a ceremony and the donation of notebook computers to the town of Hikawa and in the prefecture of Shimane, western Japan, where the plant is located. 

To read the entire press release about this important milestone, click here.

At the FOSE Conference and Exposition held in Washington D.C. this week, the Fujitsu LifeBook P8010 notebook won the GCN Best of FOSE Award in the Portable PC category. The annual competition designates the best new products showcased at the conference. 

As in years past, the Government Computer News Lab oversaw the selection process, which picked the best submissions from more 100 different companies. Editorial and testing staffs from Government Computer News and Washington Technology reviewed each entry. Winners were chosen based on four criteria: innovation, usability/applicability to government, relative performance based on specifications and value. 

“The U.S. government is the world’s largest purchaser of IT products. FOSE continues to be a showcase for the latest in technology offerings for the government – and in particular, products that meet the government’s demanding requirements for scale and security,” said Wyatt Kash, editor in chief of Government Computer News. “With so many quality submissions, we struggled to narrow down the 2008 GCN Best of FOSE winners, suggesting once again the degree of technology innovation that companies are focusing on for public sector applications.” 

To read the entire press release, please go to the GCN website. 

For years pen-enabled computing devices have enjoyed great success and acceptance in highly vertical industries like delivery services, auditing, and POS.
The primary limitations of early pen computing devices, which were the hurdles to early mainstream adoption, were the power limitations of the devices, no stable OS environment for application development, and the lack of a keyboard for traditional input.
Now, with the availability of Windows XP Tablet PC edition and Vista, which are both pen-enabled operating systems, the flexibility afforded by dual function convertible notebooks and a host of third-party applications, pen computing has expanded into areas like healthcare, insurance, education, retail, and sales force automation. What used to be strictly vertical has now caught on as a preferred alternative to standard notebooks.
In a recent webcast sponsored by TechRepublic, Paul Moore, Senior Director of Product Marketing for Fujitsu Computer Systems, discusses with TechRepublic’s James Hilliard the strides that pen computing has made in the recent past.

In a recent issue of PC Magazine, the Fujitsu LifeBook S6510 was rated 4 out of 5 as one of the greenest desktops and laptops on the market today. In their effort to determine the most environmentally-friendly systems, PC Magazine states that “2008 will go down as the year the industry made a concerted effort to build PCs that are energy-efficient (and therefore cheaper to run) and easy to recycle. To gauge their efforts, PC Magazine has created a new suite of benchmark tests and a new seal of approval. 

“We tested laptop and desktop PCs under a series of energy-usage scenarios. Since your computer sits idle most of the time, we measured each system in the idle state, open to the desktop. We also took a reading after putting each PC into sleep mode, and another reading with the system completely off to test the power brick’s energy usage. Finally, we measured how much energy each system consumed while it was doing real work.” 

As the review states, “Don’t let the Fujitsu Lifebook S6510’s … 14-inch widescreen fool you into thinking this is a hefty business laptop. At 4 pounds, it’s definitely an ultraportable. You can reap all the benefits of a true road-warrior laptop without compromising screen real estate. Even better, no performance sacrifices were made to lower the weight. This configuration loads a standard-voltage 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7700 and 2GB of RAM.” 

To read the entire article, go to the PC Magazine website. 

On March 16, at the opening day of BrainShare 2008, Fujitsu Computer Systems Corporation announced that the Fujitsu LifeBook U810, LifeBook T2010, and LifeBook P1620 ultra-portable convertible notebooks, and the LifeBook S6510 thin and light notebook have been YES Certified by Novell. The certification means the notebooks have been stringently tested for compatibility with SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop from Novell. Fujitsu Computer Systems also announced a distribution agreement with EmperorLinux, a leading Linux reseller that specializes in the installation and configuration of the Linux operating system on notebooks. 

“Fujitsu customers have expressed interest in gaining support for the Linux operating system,” said Paul Moore, senior director of mobile product marketing, Fujitsu Computer Systems Corporation. “With Novell YES certification for SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop on four popular LifeBook Series convertible tablet PCs and notebooks, Fujitsu provides these customers the opportunity to select the highly reliable and durable Fujitsu notebook that meets their business requirements.”  “YES certification on a range of Fujitsu LifeBook Series notebooks is an important addition to the lineup of systems that support SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop,” said Justin Steinman, director of marketing for Linux and Open Platform Solutions at Novell. “The leading role Fujitsu plays in the convertible laptop market provides another opportunity for SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop to continue to grow its presence in the enterprise.” Click here to read the entire press release about this important certification.

On February 14, Fujitsu Computer Systems Corporation announced that Tech Data Corporation (NASDAQ: TECD), a leading IT products distributor, will now offer the Fujitsu line of highly reliable mobile PCs, including its popular LifeBook(R) convertible tablets and small-business focused notebooks. This distribution agreement is another step in the growing relationship between Tech Data and Fujitsu and follows similar announcements regarding Fujitsu ETERNUS(R) storage solutions and PRIMERGY(R) servers. The relationship between Tech Data and Fujitsu creates one-stop-shopping for Tech Data’s broad network of resellers in the U.S. who can now support small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), health care organizations and educational institutions with a complete line of high-performance, highly reliable Fujitsu products. 

“Our customers are increasingly demanding better access to our mobile product line from a single source,” said Paul Moore, senior director, mobile product marketing, Fujitsu Computer Systems. “Tech Data and its vast number of resellers represent a tremendous opportunity to expand our reach in the SMB, healthcare, and education markets. Through Tech Data, our VAR partners will find it faster and more cost effective to fulfill their customers’ requirements for powerful, highly reliable mobile computers and high-performance desktop replacements, as well as data center needs for integrated server and storage solutions.” 

The press release announcing the Fujitsu-Tech Data agreement can be accessed here. 

One of the products that generated the most excitement at CES this year was the Fujitsu “corn” computer. The corn polymer computer was created by Fujitsu to utilize corn (or other plant-based materials) to create the plastic housing, thus resulting in a substance that bio-degrades much more quickly than other plastics. Given the emphasis placed on the environment at this show, people sought out the Fujitsu display to get a closer look. 

A number of reviewers took the opportunity to discuss bio-plastics in general with an emphasis on the “corn-puter”, including John C. Dvorak, who interviewed our own Richard McCormack. Other reviewers included Yahoo Tech, Geek.com, GreenBiz, and The Times and Democrat. Extensive coverage of the corn computer was also provided by local and national television stations. 

If you are interested in the technology behind Bio-Based Polymers, you can download a Fujitsu white paper here. 

Fujitsu is one of the sponsor companies for the Climate Savers Computing Initiative ^SM, which was formed in June of 2007. To date, more than 100 companies and organizations have joined, and the group has formed international sub-teams to expand its efforts in Japan, Europe, China and Taiwan. 

According to the Climate Savers Computing Initiative web site, the group is “a nonprofit group of eco-conscious consumers, businesses and conservation organizations dedicated to improving the power efficiency and reducing the energy consumption of computers. 

“The average desktop PC wastes nearly half the power delivered to it. The Initiative’s goal is to achieve a 50 percent reduction in computer power consumption by 2010 by producing and purchasing power-efficient products and increasing the use of power management. According to industry analyst firm Gartner, the total PC power consumption per year for a well-managed 2,500-PC-strong organization is 50 percent lower than for an unmanaged one.” 

To join or read more about the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, be sure to visit the group’s web site here.