Japan machine-makers avoid the caterpillar crawl
What's that whirring noise? It's Japan's machinery-makers at work, in contrast to investors' expectations. Results from Fanuc Corp. and Komatsu were a mixed bag Monday. Factory-automation giant Fanuc reported an 8.4 percent drop in fiscal first-half operating income and saw its shares rise, while construction-equipment-maker ...
Japanese firms see big future for small-scale industrial robots
A two-armed robot in a Chiba factory carefully stacks rice balls in a box, which a worker carries off for shipment to convenience stores. At another food-packaging plant, a robot shakes pepper and powdered cheese over pasta that a person has just arranged in ...
Depopulating rust belt counts on 'robonomics' to run assembly lines
A withering factory town in the rust belt is looking for revival through a dose of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's "robot revolution." Kadoma's population in Osaka Prefecture has shrunk 13 percent as the nation ages, prompting mergers among elementary schools and emergency services departments. Factories ...
Shouting at Japan CEOs is still a losing strategy, Fidelity says
Foreign activists returning to Japan amid a push for better governance will get no further than they did the last time by shouting for change. That's the view of Alex Treves, the head of equities at Fidelity Worldwide Investment in Tokyo. Even as company executives ...
Loeb shows how to get at Japan Inc. $1.9 trillion cash pile
Activist investor Daniel Loeb is proving determination can pay off, even in Japan. After failing to win major changes from Sony Corp., he picked an even more unlikely target in Fanuc Corp. It was a surprise then on Monday when the secretive industrial-robot maker agreed ...
Investor Dan Loeb takes on Japan's mega-bot
Hedge-fund manager Dan Loeb's budding success with Fanuc hints change may be afoot in corporate Japan.
Fanuc mulls boosting investor returns as Loeb calls for change
Three weeks after billionaire investor Daniel Loeb started a public campaign demanding changes at the industrial robot-maker, Fanuc Corp. says it will consider ways to increase investor returns. Its stock surged. The company, one of the most secretive in Japan, will start what it calls a ...
Secretive robot maker Fanuc targeted by activist investor Loeb
Fanuc Corp., one of Japan's most reclusive companies, has spent decades building a wall of secrecy around its ultra-profitable industrial-robotics business. Outsiders are rarely allowed at its complex in Yamanashi Prefecture on the slopes of Mount Fuji, where an army of yellow robots work 24/7 ...
