Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)

Approach to Green Procurement

Promotion of Green Procurement

Today, environment-related laws and regulations have become increasingly stringent worldwide. Increasingly, customers throughout the world are requesting if DISCO has acquired ISO 14001 certification and to submit information on the percentages of hazardous chemicals in our products. To address such demand, DISCO offers not only high-quality, low-cost and quickly delivered, but also environmentally friendly products.

Outline of Green Procurement at DISCO Corporation

The Green Product Guidelines formulated in March 2004 includes an item related to the consideration of environmental preservation at the time of design and development. The item is intended to avoid the use of hazardous chemicals that in end-of-life products will adversely affect global environment and human health. This concept goes along with that of the WEEE Directive^*1 and the RoHS Directive^*2 enforced in the EU.
Although the products of DISCO do not fall under the scope of these directives, we adhere to their concept and promote green procurement in order to fulfil our corporate social responsibility. To be more precise, based on the List of Restricted-Use Substances that we determined in 2003, we conducted tests for the presence of hazardous chemicals contained in the raw materials, parts and units of our products and are promoting restrictions on the use of such chemicals. The list covers 15 substances in conformance with Level A of the guidelines put out by the Japan Green Procurement Survey Standardization Initiative (JGPSSI), a program established primarily by electrical and electronics equipment manufacturers. These 15 substances include the six substances specified in the RoHS Directive and their use is restricted.

WEEE Directive: Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on waste electrical and electronic equipment. The purpose of the directive is, as a first priority, the prevention of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), and in addition, the reuse, recycling and other forms of recovery of such wastes so as to reduce the disposal of waste. The Directive entered into force on 13 August 2005, whereby each producer is responsible for financing the operations relating to the waste from his own products.

RoHS Directive: Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment. The substances covered by this Directive are lead, mercury, cadmium, hexavalent chromium, poly-brominated biphenyls (PBB) and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE). The Directive entered into force on 1 July 2006.

Green Procurement List of DISCO Restricted Substances

Group of substances	Threshold value
Cadmium and Cadmium Compounds	=< 100ppm
Hexavalent Chromium Compounds	=< 1,000ppm
Lead and Lead Compounds	=< 1,000ppm
Mercury and Mercury Compounds	=< 1,000ppm
Tributyl Tin Oxide (TBTO)	Prohibited
Tributyl Tins & Triphenyl Tins	Prohibited
Polybrominated Biphenyls (PBBs)	=< 1,000ppm
Polybrominated Diphenylethers (PBDEs)	=< 1,000ppm
Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs)	Prohibited
PolychloroNapthalenes (CI=>3)	Prohibited
ShortChain Chlorinated Paraffins	Prohibited
Asbestos	Prohibited
Azo Colorants	Prohibited
Radioactive Substances	Prohibited
Ozone Depleting Substances (CFC,HBFC,HCFC etc)	Prohibited

Notes 1

The threshold values are subject to change.

Notes 2

This List is specified in compliance with Level A of the Green Procurement Survey Standardization Guidelines developed by the Japan Green Procurement Survey Standardization Initiative: JGPSSI

Green Procurement Compliant Products

We intend to continue our efforts to provide products which meet DISCO's green procurement standards by restricting the 15 hazardous chemical substances listed in “List of DISCO Restricted Substances”. We will continually disclose information on green procurement compliant products in precision processing equipment and tools on our web page.

1. Green Procurement Compliant Products in Precision Processing Equipment

The precision processing equipment of DISCO is exempt from both WEEE and RoHS Directives as they are “large-scale stationary industrial tools” as specified in the Directives. However, we shall actively implement green procurement to reduce as much as possible the use of the 15 substances listed in the “List of DISCO Restricted Substances”, which includes the six substances specified in the RoHS Directive, in the parts installed into our products.
As the precision processing equipment has a number of technically complex parts, green procurement compliant products will be implemented in stages.
We have carried out green procurement since July 2006 for critical processing point parts for all equipment models. Moreover, in fiscal 2007, we developed products containing 100% green procured parts.

- Release DAD322/DCS1440/1460

A new dicing saw, the DAD322, and two accessory systems that clean the processed material, the DCS1440 and DCS1460, are DISCO's first fully green procured products. We were able to accomplish this despite the products requiring many specially ordered items and technically complicated parts as a result of our diligent, long-term negotiations and evaluation with suppliers. We were able to make the products environmentally conscious while at the same time maintaining or improving their performance and features. We intend to build on this success and continue to develop further green procured products.
	DAD322	DCS1460

2. Precision processing tooling compliant with green procurement

Although the DISCO precision processing tooling is outside the scope of the RoHS Directives of the EU, which apply to electrical and electronic equipment, we are promoting green procurement of materials used in our products because the precision processing tooling in the precision processing equipment has direct contact with customer's workpieces i.e. wafers in processing.