Japan Post Corp.'s 10-year road map for postal service privatization is ambitious. If things develop as the road map envisages, a mega-bank and a mega-life insurance firm will be established, possibly creating competition problems for existing private banks and insurance firms. But the road map appears to be based on overly optimistic predictions and the new firms derived through privatization may fall into difficulty.
In April 2003, the Postal Services Agency was converted into Japan Post, a public corporation, which took over the three services of mail delivery, postal savings and "kampo" life insurance from the agency.
Last January Japan Post created Japan Post Corp., a stock company. A 10-year process of postal-service privatization process will begin Oct. 1, 2007. Japan Post Corp. will become a holding company consisting of four units: Yucho Bank, Kampo Life Insurance, a mail delivery firm and an over-the-counter services firm. The entire group will have some 253,200 employees.