2011
(Posted Sept. 2011)
NMB-Minebea Thai Ltd., largest production facility of the Minebea Group
Minebea was established in 1951 as Japan's first miniature ball bearing manufacturer. Buoyed by the era of high economic growth, the company steadily expanded its business. But as Minebea entered the 1960s, demand expanded and domestic plants faced a shortage of workers. The creation of a production base with ample supplies of labor became a pressing task, and the company looked to Thailand, a country that was attracting foreign enterprises as a second Asian production facility.
Travel by car one or two hours NMB-Minebea Thai Ltd., largest production facility of the Minebea Group north of the Thai capital of Bangkok, and you can visit Minebea's five Thai manufacturing plants. Since 1982, when the Minebea Group built the Ayutthaya Plant in Ayutthaya Province and began producing miniature ball bearings, it has steadily expanded its production facilities with the Bang Pa-in, Lop Buri, Rojana, and Navanakorn Plants, expanding the scale of its business. Today, with five plants employing a total of 31,011 people (as of March 2011), this is the Minebea Group's largest production facility.
From the beginning, Minebea aimed to plant in Thailand its passion for, and commitment to, manufacturing. This was because to manufacture more high-quality products more efficiently than anyone else, and pursue "manufacturing with sincerity" that can be offered to the world, Minebea believed that the company itself had to put down roots, and that growing along with the local community was a social responsibility. This belief made environmental measures and consideration for employees, the local community and its residents natural for NMB-Minebea Thai (hereafter Minebea Thailand).
Minebea Thailand Director and Group Executive Officer Vutichai Udomkarnjananan (Vutichai) says, "We could not have grown by focusing on profits alone. It was important for us to build good relationships with everyone connected to Minebea Thailand." Below, we introduce the environmental measures and improvements to the employee working environment promoted by Minebea Thailand as part of its corporate responsibility, as well as activities, based on original employee ideas, to contribute to the local community and its residents.
