Kyocera Corporation (京セラ株式会社, Kyōsera Kabushiki-gaisha) is a Japanese company based in Kyoto, Japan. The company was founded as Kyoto Ceramic Co., Ltd. (京都セラミツク株式会社, Kyōto Seramikku Kabushiki-gaisha?) in 1959 by Kazuo Inamori. It manufactures ceramics and printing-related devices, as well as a comprehensive line of imaging products. Kyocera acquired the famous Yashica Camera Company Ltd. in 1983, along with Yashica's prior licensing agreement with Carl Zeiss, and manufactured a line of high-quality film and digital cameras under the Yashica and Contax trade names. Under intense competition by other manufacturers, and hampered by limited marketing and increased production costs, Yashica and Contax failed to increase market share. Kyocera abandoned all film and digital camera production in 2005. In January 2000, Kyocera acquired photocopier manufacturer Mita Industrial, and a month later they bought the mobile phone manufacturing operations of the American company QUALCOMM to form Kyocera Wireless.