2001

Feb.22, 2001

Withdrawal from automobile wheel business

Ever since acquired in 1977 as one of the affiliates of Minebea Co., Ltd. under the former name of Osaka Motor Wheel Co., Ltd., Minebea's Kyoto Manufacturing Unit has been engaged in the manufacture and sale of various types of wheels (for use for passenger cars, buses and trucks, and industrial and construction vehicles) mainly for the domestic market.

For these several years, our automobile wheel business has shown a trend toward negative growth both in sales and income. This is because the aftermarket for passenger cars is shrinking owing to the shift of demand from steel wheels to aluminum wheels, because users of our wheels for industrial and construction vehicles are shifting their production bases to overseas, and because competition is getting fiercer amid the increasing quantity of wheels that are imported from overseas makers.

If we get involved in the market share competition under circumstances that exclude the possibility for market expansion in the future, we would undoubtedly suffer a further increase in deficit. We have thus concluded that the wheel business will present an extremely remote possibility of growth and expansion to the degree that we hope for. This has led us to decide the withdrawal from the wheel business.

We are planning to close the Kyoto Manufacturing Unit at the end of December 2001 after completing the production of order backlog from our customers.

All the Minebea employees of the Kyoto Manufacturing Unit will be transferred to other divisions of Minebea Group companies in Japan, except for those members who are unable to move to other places for personal reasons. To such members, we are planning to offer not only a voluntary resignation plan with favorable retirement conditions, but also our full support for outplacement including our filing requests with the administrative agencies concerned for their assistance.

For further information and inquiries, please contact:

 Minebea Co., Ltd.
Corporate Communications Office, Corporate Planning Department

Ryusuke Mizukami, Senior Managing Director
Yasuaki Miyahara, in charge of corporate communications.

TEL : 03-5434-8637
FAX : 03-5434-8607

Tel : 03-5434-8637   Fax : 03-5434-8607

E-Mai:rmizukam@minebea.co.jp

Attachment: Business Summary of Minebea's Kyoto Manufacturing Unit

Minebea Co., Ltd., Kyoto Manufacturing Unit

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