Japan's largest bearings maker to build facility in Kirihara

Construction will commence this month, with the facility slated to go operational in fiscal 2017.

 

Early this month, the company has revelead plans to realize 14 billion yen ($138 million) in annual savings by fiscal 2018 via rationalizing production in its industrial machinery segment.

 

Integrated grinding machinery that can simultaneously process various parts of a bearing will trim processing and delivery times. This will enable the manufacturer to better accommodate customers who need products faster. Labor costs will also go down.

 

Production of bearings for such large industrial equipment as wind turbines and railways will move to this new location from another plant in Fujisawa.

 

Sales of bearings for industrial machinery came to 218.1 billion yen for the year ended in March, with the Fujisawa factories contributing an estimated 70 billion yen.

 

The aim is to generate savings equivalent to 20% of the facilities' annual sales in three years. While restructuring will cost approximately 10 billion yen, streamlining will help offset depreciation costs from the investment.

 

Under its medium-term management plan through fiscal 2018, NSK aims to regain competitiveness to combat the rise of European and Chinese competitors. The new factory will be key to achieving this goal.