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President's Message 2012

Management group message

January 6, 2012

Looking Forward, Outward and Upward

The year 2011 was one that brought serious difficulties to Japan's manufacturing industries, beginning with the financial crisis in North America and Europe and the extreme appreciation of the yen. Things worsened with the disastrous effects of the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami and then the terrible flooding in Thailand. However, I am proud to say that the efforts of the entire Yamaha Motor group and all our employees overcame these difficulties and allowed us to steadily implement structural reforms and continue building a foundation to enable profitability, moving us another step forward with renewed pride in the strength of our company.

We expect that the business environment will continue to present difficulties in 2012, but we intend to tackle them looking forward, outward and upward even more than before.

Looking forward

This year, we set the vision and goals for the next phase of our medium-term management plan (2013-2015). It is a plan designed to build our corporate value by achieving sustainable growth in the areas of business scale, financial strength and corporate strength. It provides us all with a common blueprint for the directions Yamaha Motor should follow, the objectives we should strive for and the things we should accomplish going forward to our 60th corporate anniversary (2015) and beyond.
The target for business scale is net sales of two trillion yen to be achieved by continuing to help create fulfilling lifestyles, enjoyment in personal mobility and innovative technologies that harmonize with people, the Earth and society. The financial strength we strive for is a balance of profitability and asset efficiency to support sustainable growth and is able to give numerical values to the type of corporate value we aim for. Finally, the corporate strength we strive for consists of setting clear objectives, strengthening competitiveness and further globalizing our technology, procurement, manufacturing, marketing and overall corporate assets in order to continue growing alongside the communities and societies where we live and work.

Looking outward

Engineering, manufacturing and marketing products is about creating value to offer the customers. Thus, the starting point for it all must come from the customers (the market). Our thoughts and actions, the way we approach the customers (market) are what create that value.

This year, we will return to that basic principle. We will continually question whether or not our priorities, vocabulary, or the work done is directed inward instead of outward. Looking to the outside with a genuine priority on the customer (market), we will work to bring about business development that is focused and effective.

Looking upward

The Yamaha Motor group's consolidated profitability is steadily improving. There were a number of factors that contributed to losses, but they were effectively absorbed by the continuing growth of motorcycle sales in emerging markets and marine product sales, and by efforts to increase income through structural reform, cost reduction and cutting expenses.

This year, we will continue with our structural improvement reform. We are also accelerating the speed of our efforts to increase sales, increase marginal profits and reduce expenses. We will take on the challenge of setting our targets high and working persistently to achieve them.

I hope you will give Yamaha Motor your ongoing support as we build toward the future.

Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd.
President, Chief Executive Officer and Representative Director
Hiroyuki Yanagi
(January 6, 2012)


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