In February of 1998, Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. (YMC) established Yamaha Motor Asia Pte. Ltd. (Representative: Yoshiki Ishida, Location: Singapore, abbreviated name: YMAP) as a 100%-owned subsidiary for the purpose of providing financial support for Yamaha manufacturing bases in the AESAN region and promoting the cross-trade export of their products. Now, as a measure to further strengthen the market competitiveness of Yamaha motorcycle operations in the region, a new company has been established in Thailand to function in the areas of planning and developing motorcycles and coordinating manufacturing and purchasing operations for the entire Asian region. With the recent granting of official approval from the Thai government, this new company begins operations as of April 1, 2001.
The name of the new company is Yamaha Motor Asian Center Co., Ltd. (abbreviated name: YMAC, starting capital: 30 million Thai bahts (approx. 90 million yen)) and it is capitalized 100% by YMAP. From now on these two companies will share in a division of functions for the coordination of operations of the various motorcycle-related manufacturing bases in the Asian region, centering around the ASEAN countries.
The primary business activities of the new company YMAC will be the promotion of motorcycle product planning and development consigned by YMC for Yamaha motorcycle models specifically for the Asian markets, and the coordination of manufacturing activities by the various manufacturing bases in the Asian region. Also, YMAC will take over from YMAP the consolidated purchasing within the region of things like parts and raw materials, and the order taking and issuing functions involving parts suppliers in overseas procurement. The company will also be involved in promoting exports of complete built-up motorcycles manufactured at the various Yamaha Manufacturing bases and accept request to fulfill the business functions involved in cross-trade exports of these products. The new company begins operations with 33 employees, and plans call for that number to be increased to about 70 by 2003.
With the establishment of YMAC, the existing YMAP will strengthen its function as a finance center involved the settlement of accounts and investment/loan management. At the same time it will work in coordination with YMAC to build a strong network for planning and development, manufacturing and purchasing as well as financing with the aim of increasing both international and local market competitiveness throughout the Asian region, which as a whole is demonstrating a trend toward growth in motorcycle demand. Presently, Yamaha Motor has eight motorcycle manufacturing bases in the Asia, including ones in the ASEAN region countries of Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, and the West Asian countries of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
In the Asian region, motorcycles are serving as vital means of transportation that improve people's lives, and demand is expected to grow. In particular, total demand in the ASEAN region is demonstrating a rapid recovery following the Asian currency crisis, reaching 2.8 million units in 2000 with an expected climb of about 50% to some 4.2 million units by 2003. With the combined factors of this climbing demand, new models and the establishment of the new company YMAC, Yamaha Motor is striving to see total shipments of Yamaha motorcycles in the five ASEAN countries to grow from the 380,000 units recorded in 2000 to a roughly doubled number of some 760,000 units in 2003. |
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