Ogura Clutch Thailand Co., Ltd. (located in Rayong, east part of Thailand) has been expanding their existing facility, and by the end of 2012, their production capacity will be 1.7 times greater than the current one with total production being 3.5 million pieces.
　Thailand is now our key plant in the South East Asian area and so far demand around this area is still strong after the big flood last year. In order to support our customer’s satisfaction, we made the decision to expand our production system.
　Approx. 3,000m2 of space will be added on top of the existing space, 10,000m2. Pressure molding machinery was already installed at the site. We continuously answer customer’s needs and stabilize our supply. Also, we search for manufacturing capacity as well as establish the production base in South East Asia.
　While our production has increased mainly in Thailand and China, we are pushing sales activity for industrial machinery such as construction equipment in Japan.

　On April 2nd 2012, as a part of our volunteering activity, our thirty employees cleaned up surrounding areas of our headquarter office and the #1 plant.
　They picked up various sizes of trash from the street. We hope that pedestrians will feel comfortable to walk around the clean-up area, and our contribution is environmentally beneficial for our society.
　This is part of our environmental cleaning activities. We will continuously organize these type of cleaning activities to raise volunteering spirit.

　The 9th Guangzhou International Automotive Air-Conditioning & Cold Chain Technology Exhibition China 2012 was held between February 24th and 26th. Our office in China, Ogura Clutch (Dong Guan) CO., LTD. participated in the show and they got favorable review from visitors. 
　We appreciate your visits and will utilize all your comments and advice gathered during the exhibition.

Our related company, Ogura Corporation (OC) was awarded by “Ford Q1”. This is an original quality control program organized by Ford Motor Company. Basically, the company reviews suppliers’ structure of quality controls to see if they can meet the company’s expecting level. 
　We are proud to announce that OC was deemed to be a supplier with the highest quality level at this time. In order to qualify for this program, all candidates (factories) must be certified by ISO/TS-16949. They are also required to implement the Quality Operating System (QOS), meet the satisfactory level under the Material Management Operations Guide (MMOG) while following Ford’s production schedule, and obtain all requirements from the Q1 program items. 
　We will continue to seek quality improvement and are devoted to customer satisfaction.

The 7th Isesaki Industry Contributor Award Ceremony was held on November 7th. Our company was awarded best contributor this year again. The main reason we got the great review is that Ogura has continuously ordered parts for clutches related to automotive air conditioning from Sansen Co. ltd. and Marunaka Ltd.
　We were able to see and collaborate with many companies at the party following the ceremony. We will continue to contribute to the further development of Isesaki Industry.

Ogura’s plant in Dongguan has completed the construction of its annex (1 story reinforced concrete building), which added 2,945 square meters (31.7thousand square feet) of production space. The annex has been operational since October, and the total annual production capacity of the plant has been increased from 1.5 million clutches to 2.5 million clutches. The main operations in the annex are machining of pulleys and assembling of armatures. Production of GT (Garden Tractor) clutches, which had been transferred from Japan last year, is also going to take place in the annex. 
　This expansion has not only increased the production capability but also greatly improved efficiency in logistics.

Nine volunteers from Ogura have participated in disaster recovery effort in the area devastated by the Earthquake and Tsunami. This program has been organized by Kiryu Disaster Recovery Support Volunteer Center, founded primarily by Kiryu Social Welfare Council. Ogura volunteers spent total 4 sundays since July and helped the locals clean up the side gutter and remove wreckage of the buildings damaged by the disaster.

We accepted a total of 13 college students for the internship program which had been held between the end of July and September. Participants of the program came from Tamagawa University, Kokushikan University, Nihon University, Gunma University, Fukui National College of Technology. All students were sent to several locations ( number one & number three plants, Kobayashi and Engineering second section ) to get experiences for various tasks. They learned different types of subjects such as production line ideas, improvement strategies for setups and others. The actual working experience was totally different from their daily school work. 
　We hope all students will be able to utilize the skills that they learned, and apply in their future careers.

Our transportation equipment division and the related departments have returned to normal business hours as of October. 
　The special hours for summertime (July-Sept) was from Saturday to Wednesday with Thursday and Friday being off. This schedule was to control electricity usage during peak hour demand. It may have caused an inconvenience, but we would like to thank you for your patience and continuous support.

On Sept 6th and 7th, eight students from Aioi Junior High School were invited to our number one and number three plants to have on-site learning experience. They learned that working was actually harder than going to school. One student said that it was tough to work there. Meanwhile, another student excitingly told us that he was able to introduce himself to various Ogura employees. 
　We wish they will be able to take advantage of this valuable experience to continuously grow and have a bright future ahead of them.