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Asahi Kasei makes progress under 'For Tomorrow 2015'

24 May '12

3 min read

The Asahi Kasei Group has completed the first year of its strategic management initiative “For Tomorrow 2015” for the five-year period from fiscal 2011 to fiscal 2015.

Taketsugu Fujiwara, President of Asahi Kasei Corporation presents the highlights of the project.

Progress achieved during fiscal 2011
For Tomorrow 2015” provides for a total of some ¥1 trillion to be invested over the five-year period for the proactive expansion of world-leading businesses and the expansion of operations in the fields related to the environment and energy, residential living, and health care which provide new value for society by contributing to “living in health and comfort” and “harmony with the natural environment.” In fiscal 2011, decisions were adopted for investments of some ¥300 billion in accordance with these strategies.

Of this amount, some ¥100 billion was for expansion of existing operations.

Notable items by business sector are as below:
• Chemicals & Fibers : New facility in Singapore for solution-polymerized styrene-butadiene rubber and addition of a second plant, additional plant for acrylonitrile in Korea, new plant for acetonitrile in Korea
• Homes & Construction Materials : New line for Neoma phenolic foam insulation panels
• Electronics : New plant for dry film photoresist in China
• Health Care : Acquisition of full ownership of Artisan Pharma, Inc.

The remaining ¥200 billion was for the establishment of new businesses, as below:
• Environment & Energy : Acquisition of Crystal IS, Inc., establishment of joint venture for Li ion capacitors
• Residential Living : Construction of “HH2015” demonstration home
• Health Care : Acquisition of ZOLL Medical Corporation

The operating climate for the Asahi Kasei Group is a challenging one, with global economic stagnation, a high exchange value of the yen, and elevated prices of feedstocks and fuel. To swiftly respond to these challenges, we will steadily advance our strategies to expand world-leading businesses and businesses which create new value for society, while implementing measures to improve the earnings structure for strong business foundations. As previously announced, our targets for fiscal 2015 include consolidated net sales of ¥2 trillion and operating income of ¥200 billion.

In April 2012 Asahi Kasei completed a tender offer process to acquire ZOLL Medical Corporation, a leading US manufacturer of critical care devices, for US$2.21 billion (approximately ¥183 billion) to facilitate our advancement into the field of critical care, a primary focus of our “Health Care for Tomorrow” project. With resuscitation technology as its core technology, ZOLL is the US market leader in defibrillators for use by hospitals and emergency medical services, and has many high-growth products such as the LifeVest wearable defibrillator for patients at risk of sudden cardiac arrest.

Over the near term, we will accelerate the growth of the critical care business principally through expanded sales of the LifeVest and other products in the US, while over the longer term we aim to establish a world-leading position in critical care by enhancing the global regulatory and sales infrastructure and by developing additional innovative new products. The acquisition of ZOLL provides Asahi Kasei with critical care as a new high-growth field of operation, and by combining this with our existing operations we are targeting fiscal 2020 sales on the order of ¥500 billion with an operating income rate of 15% in the Health Care business sector.

The Asahi Kasei Group