The incident had a great impact, and the Japanese media described it as a "Kobe shock" that "shook Japan's manufacturing industry." Coupled with the fraud scandals exposed by many Japanese companies earlier, the national brand "Made in Japan" is casting a shadow.
& gt& gt data fraud began 10 years ago.
Kobe Steel Works is the third largest steel company in Japan, second only to Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Corporation and JFE Steel Company. Its crude steel output is 7.259 million tons, ranking 53rd among global steel companies. As one of the top 500 enterprises in the world, Kobe Steel enjoys a high reputation in Japan. At present, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe works in new york Branch of Kobe Steel Works, 1979. Kobe Steel Works officially entered the China market on 20 10, with its headquarters in Shanghai. There are factories in Suzhou, Tianjin, Anshan and other places.
Such an enterprise with a long history and outstanding strength found in the internal investigation at the end of August this year that its three aluminum plants in Tochigi, Mie and Yamaguchi counties and its copper products subsidiary in Kanagawa County have long tampered with the factory data of some aluminum products and copper products and passed them off as qualified products to the market.
The above-mentioned factories have found that some aspects of the products are not up to standard before leaving the factory, but the strength and size data in the product inspection certificate have been revised. Mr. Meiyuan Renshang, vice president of Kobe Steel Works, publicly apologized and said: I apologize for tampering with the data and am reflecting. Meiyuan Ren Shang said, "This is due to the pressure of on-time delivery."
Fraud is not "Rome was not built in a day". After investigation, it was found that dozens of people, including managers, participated in it, which shows that the fraud case of Kobe Steel Works is a long-term and collective behavior. Mr. Meiyuan also admitted that some products began to use tampered data from 10 years ago, and tampering with data was not done by individuals, but by the acquiescence of management, which was a problem of the whole company.
It is also reported that counterfeit aluminum products have affected about 200 customers, mainly automobile manufacturers, and Japanese automobile giants including Toyota, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan and Suzuki have all been affected.
Take Toyota as an example. Toyota has confirmed the use of defective products produced by Kobe Steel, including the engine hood and tailgate of some models assembled in Japanese factories, while the engine hood and other parts of some models use defective aluminum products. Toyota is confirming car safety, and if it involves car performance and safety, it will trigger a large-scale recall.
What worries the Japanese industry even more is that these problem products have even flowed into the Japanese defense field. At present, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Kawasaki Heavy Industries, IHI Co., Ltd. and Subaru have confirmed that their defense products also use the defective aluminum products of Kobe Steel Works. The latest report pointed out that even the weapons used by the Japanese Self-Defense Forces may use raw materials supplied by Kobe Steel.
The impact of data fraud scandal on Kobe Steel is fermenting. 10 10 On the same day, the share price of Kobe Steel Works in Tokyo stock market plummeted by 22%, the highest drop in a single day. 65438+1October 1 1, the stock price of Kobe steel works in Tokyo stock market continued to dive. In just two trading days, the stock price plummeted by 34%, and the market value of $6543.8+$50 million "evaporated".
If the subsequent recall event is triggered, the cost will be even greater. Ren Shangmeiyuan, deputy director of Kobe Steel Works, said that it is not excluded that some customers will recall the problem vehicles and are currently negotiating with relevant enterprises.
Before the scandal was exposed, the aluminum and copper departments had been the main revenue-generating departments of Kobe Steel Works. According to the company's annual revenue and expenditure report, due to the rising cost of raw materials in the steel industry, Kobe Steel Works has suffered losses for two consecutive years, but the aluminum and copper department achieved a profit income of 654.38+02 billion yen (about 700 million yuan) in the last fiscal year.
& gt& gt "Scandals Frequent" Made in Japan
The story of Kobe Steel Works is not a case. Recently, "Made in Japan" scandals have occurred frequently: Japanese auto giant Nissan used a large number of unqualified personnel to perfunctory the factory inspection procedures during the factory inspection; Mitsubishi and Suzuki tampered with the test data of automobile fuel economy; Japanese auto parts manufacturer Takada filed for bankruptcy in June this year for concealing the quality defects of airbags.
For a long time, Japanese manufacturing has been world-renowned for its precision, rigor and excellent quality. "Waiting in line to buy Japanese toilet seats" once became a hot topic in China media, and "Toyota that won't break down" has been recognized by drivers all over the world for many years. Nowadays, the intensive outbreak of Japanese enterprise fraud has shocked the industry. What happened to "Made in Japan"?
Chen, director of the Japan Economic Research Center of Shanghai University of International Business and Economics, who has long studied Japanese companies, said that although Japanese manufacturing is well-known, loopholes in production management such as tampering with product data and production date have always existed. "Entering the information age, with the changes in Japanese society, it is getting easier and easier to expose these problems. In fact, Japanese companies are no different from other companies, but they are shrouded in aura and reputation. "
Wu Baoning, director of the Japan Institute of Modern Culture, believes that on the one hand, downstream enterprises are increasingly asking upstream enterprises to reduce costs. On the other hand, enterprises emphasize the creation of profits and income, ignoring social responsibility, and how to balance the relationship between them requires interest adjustment.
The reporter sorted out a number of exposed fraud incidents, and the Japanese companies involved all gave factors such as "internal management, executive ethics, performance pressure". However, so many representative Japanese manufacturing enterprises have exposed major scandals such as tampering, forgery, concealment and false reporting, which undoubtedly shows the deep crisis of Japan's economic and social development.
From the comparison of the list of the world's top 500 enterprises, Japanese enterprises as a whole are "sinking". 1996 There are as many as 99 Japanese companies on the list of the world's top 500 companies, which is comparable to that of the United States; In 2006, the number of Japanese companies on the list has been reduced to 70; 20 16 years, only 52. Compared with 20 years ago, the number of Japanese companies on the list has dropped by nearly half.
The "depravity" of Japanese manufacturing industry only reflects the tip of the iceberg of the great changes in Japan's economic environment under the wave of globalization. How to improve Japan's economy has become a key issue concerning Japan's "revival" or "sinking". "