ALPS Strengthens Sensor Technology Partnership with Qualtré, Inc.

Aiming for Additional Sensor Product Variety and Faster Development

Duesseldorf, Germany, June 13, 2013 – ALPS ELECTRIC (Headquarters: Ota-ku, Tokyo; President: Toshihiro Kuriyama) in May 2013 made an investment in Qualtré, Inc. (Headquarters: Massachusetts, U.S.A.; CEO: Edgar Masri). ALPS and Qualtré already carry out joint development of inertial sensors. The investment reinforces the existing partnership and allows for further strengthening of ALPS’ sensor business. ALPS and Qualtré have engaged in joint development of inertial sensors, used to detect various kinds of motion, since 2008. The US$3 million strategic investment by ALPS is intended to facilitate Qualtré’s development and sales of these sensors and to further enhance the range of sensor products supplied by ALPS in this core business segment under the SENSORING™ slogan. Qualtré is developing next-generation MEMS inertial sensor technology for the consumer, automotive and industrial markets. In the partnership with ALPS, the company is in charge of the sensor devices and IC design. Qualtré applies bulk acoustic wave (BAW) MEMS sensor technology to develop technology employing high frequencies of several megahertz to achieve excellent impact characteristics with outstanding immunity to extraneous noise, as well as significantly higher performance/cost ratio than its competitors’ products. ALPS currently supplies a wide range of sensor products to the automotive, consumer, industrial and healthcare markets. The company’s compact and high-precision magnetic sensors, in particular, are employed in various digital devices. The commercialization of new products fusing Qualtré’s technology and ALPS’ excellent packaging technology will allow the addition of inertial sensors, such as gyroscopes and acceleration sensors, to the product lineup and provide further impetus for development activities. The partnership will enable ALPS to continue addressing diverse needs for features like pedestrian navigation, location-aware services and camera optical image stabilization in digital equipment, as typified by smartphones. Qualtré, Inc. Founded in 2008, Qualtré is a venture-backed company commercializing the next generation of solid-state silicon MEMS motion sensor solutions for consumer, automotive and industrial applications. Qualtré’s innovation addresses the real challenges multiple applications by combining the performance advantages of the BAW sensor design and the cost and size scalability of the HARPSS™ process to deliver the best value in inertial sensors. The company is headquartered in Marlborough, Massachusetts. More information can be found at www.Qualtré.com.

ALPS Electric Co., Ltd. ALPS Electric (Tokyo: 6770) is a leading global manufacturer of high-quality electronic components for mobile devices, home electronics, vehicles and industrial equipment. With the philosophy of "Perfecting the Art of Electronics" ALPS Electric supplies over 40,000 different components to about 2,000 companies all over the world. For more information, visit www.alps.com. ALPS ELECTRIC EUROPE GmbH, a subsidiary of ALPS Electric Co., Ltd., was established in 1979. Since 1989 the European Head Office has been located in Düsseldorf, where a team of specialists works in Sales, Marketing, and Product Engineering. The activities of our branch offices in Munich, Paris, Milton Keynes, Gothenburg, and our sales office in Milan are coordinated from Düsseldorf.