CASE STUDY

SIGMA (Asao-ku, Kawasaki City), a manufacturer of interchangeable lenses and cameras, and HIOS, a manufacturer of screws and electric screwdrivers in Sumida-ku, Tokyo -- both of them constantly develop unparalleled proprietary products. Kazuto Yamaki, President of SIGMA, and Katsuyuki Totsu, President of HIOS discussed their passion for manufacturing.

More than 100,000 screws are fastened per day. For Ebina Plant, FUJIFILM MANUFACTURING, which produces high-speed and high-performance printers for commercial printing, screw fastening is crucially important for every one of its manufacturing processes. Since a single missing or loose screw can lead to product defects, a strict control system for fastening is essential. While implementing production innovative activities based on FUJIFILM’s IPW (Innovative Production Way), the Ebina Plant decided to introduce HIOS’s digital screwdrivers, JUKUREN BLG-BC2, with a built-in screw counter pulse system to facilitate further quality improvement and high efficiency.

Lake Biwa, Japan's largest and oldest freshwater lake, is said to have a history of approximately four million years. Facing the southeast of the lake, Kusatsu City, Shiga Prefecture continues to develop as a focal point between Kinki and Chubu metropolitan areas. It is one of the few cities in Japan where the population continues to grow despite the country's declining birthrate and aging population. Kusatsu Factory, the main base of OMRON's factory automation business, is at the forefront of manufacturing in this region. Inheriting the philosophy of the company's founder, Kazuma Tateishi, the Kusatsu Factory works on uninterrupted productivity improvement.

The catchphrase of Mitsubishi Electric's Sanda Works is "Creating the Future of People and Cars". Their main customers are in the automotive industry, where safety and security are absolute requirements. The article covers Sanda Works's adoption of HIOS's "Totupla" and "INTRTORQUE" as well as the brushless electric screwdriver "JUKUREN" BLG-BC2 from the perspectives of quality improvement, digital transformation (DX), and reducing environmental impact.

Optimize “variable-type, variable-volume manufacturing” with cutting-edge technologies
Optimize “variable-type, variable-volume manufacturing” with cutting-edge technologies Tosu City (Saga Prefecture) is close to Fukuoka City and important transportation nodes of national roads and railways. The city's population is the third largest in the prefecture after Saga City and Karatsu City. Sagan Tosu, a J-League football team, has its home ground adjacent to the station.

Yamagata Prefecture is known for the largest harvest of fruits such as cherries, pears, and akebia in Japan and hot springs in all of its municipalities. In this prefecture, there is a manufacturer that consistently adheres to Made in Japan: YAMAGATA CASIO. As the only manufacturing site in Japan of the CASIO Group, which is known for the production of G-SHOCK, this manufacturer was established in 1979, has 607 employees, and produces watches, calculators, and medical devices. Maintaining its presence as a mother factory that controls group manufacturing sites in Thailand and China, it has promoted digital production. In early June, when the harvest season of “Sato Nishiki”, premium grade cherries, had just started there, we visited this manufacturer in Higashine City, with a population of 48 thousand, located in the central part of Yamagata Prefecture.