The plant in north-west Hungary, which opened in 2003, makes and decorates plastic and silicone rubber keymats for cellular phones and other electronic goods. Sunarrow said it would halt production at the end of September 2009.

Komarom plant is one of only two manufacturing units Tokyo-based Sunarrow operates in Europe. The second, also opened in 2003, is in Salo, Finland. Group customers include international names including Nokia, NEC, Sony, Fujitsu and Casio.

The global recession and falling demand for mobile phone handsets in Europe have already had a serious impact on telecoms component manufacturers operating in Komárom. Earlier this year, the Finnish handset moulder Perlos, owned by Taiwanese electronics group Lite-On Technology, shut down its Komárom plant with the loss of more than 500 jobs.

Sunarrow, which aims its output at customers in Western and Eastern Europe, uses decorative techniques including metal hot stamping and mirror printing with metallised ink to give products an extra gloss finish.

The Japanese company also operates three Chinese plants in Xiamen, Beijing and Shenzhen, one at Saraburi, Thailand, and four in Japan.