October 2, 2008
NTN Forms NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION
NTN Corporation (hereafter NTN) has established NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION in the city of Akaiwa, Okayama prefecture to expand its tapered roller bearing (*1) business.
1. Purpose of the new company
The demand for tapered roller bearings, which are used in automotive and industrial machinery such as construction and mining equipment and agricultural machinery, has been increasing due to natural resource and energy needs throughout the world. While NTN currently manufactures tapered roller bearings at three locations in Japan (Okayama works, Kuwana Works and Mie Corporation) , NTN has decided to establish the NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION to respond to the growing demand and to diversify production risk for such products.
NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION will manufacture small, light, long life and high function tapered roller bearings for automotive applications and large tapered roller bearings for industrial machinery. Demand for these bearings is expected to increase. NTN will strengthen the competitiveness of small tapered roller bearings by installing the production system for FA type tapered roller bearings using a special heat treatment technology developed by NTN (*2).
(*1) Tapered roller bearing: Bearings using tapered rollers as rolling elements
(*2) Fine Austenite Strengthening treatment (FA): Special heat treatment technology developed by NTN to improve fatigue life by miniaturizing the particle size of bearing steel to less than a half of conventional size.
2. Schedule
NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION will start production in September 2009 with approx. 70 employees. To respond to the mounting demand, the monthly production capacity will be increased to 700,000 bearings at the end of fiscal 2010 and then to 2 million at the end of fiscal 2013.
3. Outline of the new company
| (1) | Company name | : NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION |
| (2) | Location | : 100-43, Tsurii, Akaiwa city, Okayama prefecture |
| (3) | Business line | : Production and sales of tapered roller bearings |
| (4) | Established | : September 16, 2008 |
| (5) | Investor | : NTN 100% |
| (6) | Total investment | : Approx. 13.5 billion yen |
| (7) | Site area | : Approx. 66,000 m2 |
| (8) | Total floor space | : Approx. 22,000 m2 |
| (9) | Construction start | : December 2008 |
| (10) | Operations start | : September 2009 |
| (11) | Employees | : Approx. 70 initially, and approx.180 after 5 years |
 Image of NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION |
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[ Reference ]
NTN Corporation:
| Head office location: | 1-3-17, Kyomachibori, Nishiku, Osaka |
| Chairman: | Yasunobu Suzuki |
| President: | Tatsuo Kondo |
| Incorporated: | March 1934 (Founded: March 1918) |
| Capital: | 42.3 billion yen |
| Number of employees: | 5,400 (consolidated 18,960) (As of March 31, 2008) |
| Annual sales: | 359.9 billion yen (consolidated 534.0 billion yen) (As of March 31, 2008) |
| Main business: |
Production and sales of bearings, constant-velocity joints, precision equipment Bearing market share: No.2 in Japan, No.3 in the world Constant-velocity joint market share: No.1 in Japan, No.2 in the world |
Tapered roller bearings manufactured at NTN AKAIWA CORPORATION:
Tapered roller bearings use tapered rollers as rolling elements. They feature higher load capacity and rigidity than bearings using steel balls. They are mainly used for more severe applications requiring longer life, such as mining machinery, construction machinery, and agricultural machinery among industrial applications and in automotive transmissions and differential gears.
Conventional product
In addition to the small, light, longer life and high function “FA type tapered roller bearings”, NTN also developed an “Ultra low torque tapered roller bearing”, with half the rotational torque of a conventional bearing while maintaining the same life and rigidity. The new bearing meets recent demands for energy saving and fuel efficiency in automotive and industrial applications.
FA type tapered roller bearing
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