Japan trading company shapes global tech sector
Investing both capital and knowhow in a U.S.-based startup, a Japanese trading company is helping to shape the global future of the lithium-ion battery market.
It's an unusual approach to global business development, but in a recent interview with Hiroaki Murase of trading company ITOCHU Corp. in Tokyo, the advantages of its investment model are manifest.
Last year ITOCHU invested $20 million in EnerDel for a 5% stake in maker of batteries and storage cells for electric vehicles and other applications.
"Our primary goal is to enhance the strategic energy storage value chain around battery development," according to Murase.
"Jointly with ITOCHU's Chemical Department we are starting Cathode materials projects in the US and China. We are working with those materials to better engineer and produce a viable power train and charging station and to better use the auto battery for a range of applications. This will help to reduce costs and to enhance the usability of lithium-ion batteries in a larger market."
To better understand ITOCHU's strategy, and to provide insight into potential modes of cooperation between Japanese and US corporations in the alternative energy sector, KWR President Keith W. Rabin recently interviewed Hiroaki Murase, a key manager in the Aerospace & Industrial Systems Division, Battery System Section of ITOCHU Corporation in Tokyo.
Rabin notes that "up to the first decades after WW II, Japan's major trading companies handled the bulk of the nation's imports and exports, and in a literal sense trading was their major function."
More recently companies like ITOCHU have "emphasized investment, owning or taking share in various businesses around the world, and using their market knowledge and distribution and customer networks to build value chains.
"While still very diversified in terms of industries, they also are focusing more on growth sectors and growth markets. ITOCHU, for example, remains very active in traditionally strong fields, such as food, textiles and conventional (i.e., fossil and nuclear) energy, but is putting particular emphasis on such fields as new and alternative energy, water, and healthcare and high-growth markets such as China" Rabin observed. Read full interview here.
