Mitsubishi Electric Develops Industry's Thinnest 2 Megapixel CCD Camera Module

July 14, 2004

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation has developed a 2 megapixel CCD camera module which is a mere 7.42mm wide, making it the industry’s thinnest (as of May 30, 2004). Sample shipments will be available during July 2004, at a unit price of 15,000 yen (FOB Japan), while mass production will start in September 2004.

As the domestic Japanese and overseas markets for mobile phones with cameras continues to grow, so too do the camera’s megapixel capacities. In order to increase megapixel capacity and enable mobile phone handsets to be made thinner, we used the technological expertise and know-how gained from our module development to date to achieve the industry’s thinnest 2 megapixel CCD camera module.

The module features an advanced optical design and the latest mounting technology. The “super CCD honey cam” (registered trademark of Fuji Photo Film, Inc.) makes it highly sensitive and capable of producing high quality images, even in dark places with low illumination. The CCD image sensor, power supply and signal processing LSI were all integrated into the module, reducing the space it requires in the mobile phone handset and allowing the handset to be thinner. The 2 megapixel CCD camera module is of the same size and interface as the Mitsubishi Electric 1.3 megapixel CCD camera module, providing customers with greater choice, depending on their requirements.

Each individual module allows for fine control of the AE (automatic exposure) and AWB (automatic white balance) functions. The shutterless camera is highly smear-tolerant1, and reproduces color in a natural and lifelike manner. Selection of an 8-bit or 16-bit digitalinterface2 is also possible, plus the flexible printed circuit (FPC) can be customized in accordance with the customer’s wishes.