Offering High Reliability in up to 85 Degrees Celsius NEC TOKIN Corporation (President: Masakazu Okabe; Head office: Sendai, Japan) announces that it has developed "Supercapacitor FGR Series", which is a new product line of highly reliable electric double layer capacitors that can be used in a wide operating temperature range (-40 degrees Celsius to +85 degrees Celsius) with guaranteed maximum operating temperature of 85 degrees Celsius. Mass production of the series starts in May. Electric double layer capacitor "Supercapacitor" is an energy storage device that utilizes the phenomenon known as electric double layer, where positive and negative charges are stored at a solid-liquid interface. This type of capacitor has various features, such as "large electric capacitance", "no theoretical limit to the number of times of charging/discharging, resulting in longer life" and "rapid electric charge/discharge in a few seconds" as well as "using materials with less environmental impact". Consequently, it is used in many applications, including memory back-up for audio-visual equipment such as DVD players, instantaneous heating function in a copy machine, and self-luminous raised markers. However, conventional electric double layer capacitors have a disadvantage that their life is shortened under high temperature conditions because they use electrolyte. In response to this problem, NEC TOKIN has improved electrode materials and succeeded in developing “Supercapacitor FGR Series” electric double layer capacitors, which are smaller than conventional models and guarantee maximum operating temperature of 85 degrees Celsius. The FGR Series can be used in a wide operating temperature range from -40 degrees Celsius to +85 degrees Celsius (-25 degrees Celsius to +70 degrees Celsius for our conventional FG Series), ensuring high reliability during operation under higher and lower temperatures. In addition, it has achieved a long life of 3,500 hours, the longest in the industry, in a high temperature load test at 85 degrees Celsius. (Examination of FGR0H225ZF model by the Company, capacitance change was within 30 percent.) FGR Series can provide reliable memory back-up functions to car audios and clock ICs, which are often exposed to high temperature in the car under the scorching sun. Mass production of the series is scheduled to begin in May with a monthly output of one million units. (Reference sample price: 250 yen per unit for FGR0H105ZF model.)