CHIBA, Japan — Seiko Instruments Inc. (SII) announces today that it has decided to withdraw the electronic dictionary business as of March 31st, 2015.
SII launched its electronic dictionary business in 1987. In 1992, TR-700 was introduced, the industry’s first full-fledged electronic dictionary containing the full textual content of English-Japanese and Japanese-English dictionaries. It offered new value of using keyboards to quickly search for the information that could be found in print dictionaries. Since then, we have provided a wide range of dictionaries to meet the needs of users including students, business people, and medical specialists, to support their business and language study.
However, reflecting on the fact that the electronic dictionary market is matured and shrinking, and that smart devices including smartphones and tablet PCs are popularized, we have judged that the electronic dictionary’s demand growth can be no longer anticipated and determined to discontinue their production and sales. We would like to express our gratitude for your patronage of SII electronic dictionaries over the years.
The repair services, inquiries, and Dayfiler Club (the services including data download) will be available through our CP service center even after April 2015.
In regard to the know-how of leveraging dictionary contents as well as the search services that have been cultivated through the electronic dictionary business, we will examine the possibility of utilizing them within the Seiko Holdings Group.
Contact Information
Corporate Communications Dept. Seiko Instruments Inc. pr@sii.co.jp