BY BRAD MEYER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

If you drive a car or own a cell phone, there's a good chance you're using products developed and creat­ed by Sawyer Technical Materials in Conroe. The innovative high-tech company has been pioneering quartz technology since 1956.

The company celebrated its 50th year of service on Sunday with a cel­ebration for employees and cus­tomers at the plant in Conroe. In addition to food and fun, the compa­ny provided impressive displays of their high-tech capabilities to edu­cate guests and family members attending the event.

Originally founded in Eastlake, Ohio in 1956, the company was com­missioned by the U.S. Army to research quartz technology- prima­rily in communications. Sawyer Technical Materials became the lead­ing manufacturer of cultured quartz and quartz component technology. Scientific research developed an amazing array of uses for quartz crystals. The commercial, industrial and military applications have revo­lutionized modern life. Quartz watch­es, CB radios, digital electronics, com­puters and wireless telecommunica­tions rely on cultured quartz crystals.

"The Conroe facility is the largest quartz wafer processing plant in the world," President Kelley Scott said. "We are constantly developing newer, faster and more innovative uses of our products."

Scott was one of the original founders of Crystal Systems in Con­roe in 1972. Seven years later, Sawyer Technical Materials acquired the company and Scott. The Ohio plant produces the cultured crystal blocks and ships them to the Conroe facility for processing. In Conroe, the large crystals go through a number of steps according to exact specifications from the man­ufacturers who order them. They are sliced into thin wafers, cut to specific sizes and thicknesses and subjected to special polishing.

Quartz technology continues to develop, according to VP of Market­ing and Sales Janet Radwanski, in town to help celebrate the company milestone. "We are helping develop electronic stability controls being incorporated into modern cars and SUV's," Radwanski said. "It's yet another consumer benefit for quartz technology."

Radwanski also pointed out the company is evolving its technological capabilities with other substances. Lithium tantalite is another new product with a diverse range of end uses in wireless communication, automotive sensors and other applications the company has begun processing.

While the Conroe plant currently employs approxi­mately 125 people, it has the capacity to handle more work and more employees. "We had nearly 500 people working here when cell phone technology was just taking off," Scott said.

While Sawyer Technical Materials does not manufac­ture consumer goods or industrial end-products, it is a key supplier of high-tech quartz components. "We're a small, independent company that is very innovative and efficient," Scott said. "But we're the biggest in the world at what we do,"