President
In 2009, Furukawa Electric is celebrating the 125th anniversary of its founding. I would like to first express my sincere gratitude to all the stakeholders concerned for supporting us for over five quaters of a century.
Encountering the drastic changes in surrounding business environment, I shall promote the following five measures to achieve our sustainable growth and development.
1.Bolstering global development
For a company to achieve its sustainable earnings and growth, it must increase its sales. It has now become imperative for us to develop our operations from a global perspective so that we can improve our operations. For this reason, in addition to our commitment to achieve an overseas sales ratio of 35%, the goal set out in “New Frontier 2012”, we will seek to develop our global operations further, expanding the ratio to more than 50% over the long term.
2.Strengthening manufacturing capabilities
Furukawa Electric is a manufacturer with a history of 127 years, and it is an industry pioneer that has won the Deming Prize in Japan. The most fundamental element of a manufacturer is, above all, its manufacturing capabilities. By refining the spirit of Takumi, namely the workmanship that is often featured as one of the characteristics of the Japanese people, we are committed to strengthening our manufacturing capabilities to assist customers and contribute to society.
3.Developing “ultra” technologies
We face rising prices nonferrous metals, such as copper and aluminum, and petrochemicals, all of which are important to our business. This reflects increasing global demand, particularly from China. In the meantime, we are witnessing a global commitment to reducing CO2 emissions. With a focus on the environment, Furukawa Electric will accept the challenge of developing new "ultra" technologies, which represent a bold transformation in manufacturing processes, in all sectors.
4.Improving the ability to propose solutions
We will continue to anticipate the future needs of customers, offering proposals from their standpoint and with an emphasis on new products and processes. As our business is essentially a component business based on functional materials, we will always seek to improve usability, and strive to achieve modularization and unitization.
5.Bolstering the development of human resources
The key for achieving the targets set out in the medium-term business plan, “New Frontier 2012”, lies in our human resources. Our corporate message, Bound to Innovate, is embodied by the employees of the Furukawa Electric Group. With BRICs countries expanding their global presence, a new global phenomenon has emerged: resource inflation and industrial product deflation. This makes it more imperative now than ever before to have the ability to respond to change, and especially changes in the environment. To ensure that we do indeed possess this ability, we will build human resources strength, irrespective of nationality, age, or gender.