We’ve Introduced New Equipment!
On December 21, in cold but mild weather, we shipped in and installed new equipment at our D Building.
We removed the equipment that we had been using for many years, and this new replacement will serve to consolidate processes and enable operation of the factory with a small crew.
After installation adjustment, we promptly did a test run to improve the machining on the target workpiece.
All around us, the prospects going into 2021 are quite severe, but we are breaking down bad habits that needed to be changed, overcoming issues, and continuing our internal kaizen efforts.
Now is just the time to improve our company!
We will do our utmost to make our ongoing 50th year a turning point for advancement!
We hope that we can rely on your continued guidance.
We’ve Introduced New Equipment!
Today, December 18, we shipped in and installed a new image measuring machine!
This brilliant device not only performs image measurement but also possesses the functions of a contact-type 3D measuring machine and a height gauge.
While we don’t think a simple comparison between contact-type measuring devices and these new devices is possible, it is our understanding that, in terms of measurement accuracy and reliability, the former remains the better option.
However, in terms of measurement time, this new device is much faster.We also believe the measurement disparity between a skilled, knowledgeable measurer and an amateur will be reduced.
Our products include a great many important components that have an enormous impact on the specs of our customers’ products, and many are used over a very long period of time, so, not only is it a matter of course that each of our products will need to be excellent and do the job, something that is also strongly demanded is flawless management of when, how, and by whom work is performed, whether the work method is appropriate, whether each process is evaluated correctly, and so on.
This requires a lot of man-hours, and it is therefore necessary to improve the productivity of our inspection and evaluation processes.
With convenient tools that are constantly evolving, it is necessary to try them out: otherwise, their strengths and weaknesses will remain unknown.We believe that, in the pursuit of excellent manufacturing, it is inevitable that we pursue the right tools to use.
Anyway, we will use this well, and construct an environment that will encourage our customers to feel comfortable relying on us!
An Article on Our Company Appeared in Diamond’s Legacy Company 5!
Our company was covered in the book Legacy Company 5, published by Diamond on October 27!
Joining a list of 30 prestigious companies, we were profiled in a six-page article.
The subtitle of the Legacy Company series of books is “Long-Standing Companies Spanning Generations and the Drama of Their Traditions and Innovations.”
In Legacy Company 5, 30 companies were profiled, many of which have histories much longer than our 65 years, with 14 having been founded more than a century ago and four more than two centuries ago: the single oldest company on the list was Ohtsuka Sangyo Material Co., Ltd., which was founded 314 years ago.
Long-standing companies have of course overcome the waves of massive recession that come by roughly every decade or so, such as the bursting of Japan’s bubble economy, the 2008 financial crisis, and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
I believe that in this process, such companies have not only preserved their traditions but have also achieved numerous innovations.
Here at our company, too, even though our name is Morikawa Gauge Works, our current sales ratio for gauges is less than 1%, so, while the name is meant to show our ongoing pride in our ability to produce the gauges that serve as the basis and standard for the measurements that are required for manufacturing, practically speaking we have already ceased to be a gauge specialist.
Our main focus has already shifted to the design and manufacture of hydraulic equipment and the manufacture of diesel engine equipment for ships, so that now it would probably be more accurate to call us “Morikawa Valves” or “Morikawa Precision.”
We are constantly updating the products that we handle, in order to respond to the changing times, the changing market, and the changing needs of our customers.
Nevertheless, we can take pride in the fact that our corporate philosophy, which forms the core of our business, has never wavered even the slightest.
As our company is still developing, we will need to innovate many more times going forward.
We are deeply grateful for the efforts of all of our stakeholders who have supported and patronized us over the years so that we have become the company that we are today, and we will continue to strive to “change what should be changed, and keep what should be kept.”
We hope that we can continue to rely on you!
We Are Now Marking Our 50th Year Since Our Establishment as a Stock Company!
Our company was first founded on January 1, 1955, and was incorporated as a stock company on September 1, 1971.
And so, starting on the 1st of this month, we are commemorating our 50th year as a stock company.
The reason we have been able to stay in business all these long years is the assistance of all of our stakeholders, for which we are very grateful.
The above photo was taken around June 1955, very soon after our company’s founding, and is the oldest extant example of a photo that shows how our company looked back then.
* The person in the middle, back row, in the photo is our founder, Itsuso Morikawa, and the woman to the right is his wife, Rokue.The person on the far right at the front is our previous president, Hidenori Morikawa (in his first year of junior high school at the time).
Our original business—the manufacture of gauges—currently accounts for less than 1% of our sales. At present, by applying precision finishing technology, our main business has shifted to the manufacture of engine equipment for ships and the design and manufacture of hydraulic equipment.
In addition, we have recently been strengthening our pre-processing machining in order to further improve our precision finishing technology. As a result, we are receiving more orders for machining alone, not including finishing and assembly, and the ratio of our business is changing.
Our first job after going into business was engraving of temple bells (the actual product is currently on exhibit in the office of our No. 2 Factory),
and while it is not widely known, from the time of our founding until our gauge manufacturing took off, there was a period in which we developed and sold choppers (grinding machines) and massage machines, and even after that we tried a wide range of products, from food processors to robots that mimic people.
Not only sticking to the current status, we will respond to market and customer requests as much as possible, even if doing so differs slightly from our core business: that spirit of constant trial is surely the true heart of our company.
We will continue to strive forward, based on our corporate philosophy of “Taking pride in responding by hook or by crook, gaining achievement through action,” in the way that makes our company unique.
We at Morikawa Gauge Works hope that we can rely on your continued patronage!
We’ve Introduced New Equipment!
On May 21, we shipped in a new horizontal machining center!
We will soon be performing adjustment and start-up, and connecting it to the equipment being installed ahead of time.
After a small-scale trial, we will also be setting it up to allow even wider-scale linkage.
We are brimming with anticipation for this initiative: that it will be of use in the post-COVID era, that it will go as we conceptualized it...
While it probably won’t be so easy, we want to set our sights high and take on the challenge!