Introduction

The autumn 2008 failure of an American securities company marked the onset of a financial crisis that quickly grew to the global scale. Japanese corporations also felt a major impact, Shibaura Mechatronics among them, and we saw significant reductions in our principal area of business, orders for manufacturing equipment for semiconductors and flat panel displays.
Even in these circumstances, we cannot ignore or forget the realiy of environmental issues, such as climate change and threats to biodiversity, the depletion of resources and energy sources. These are problems that increasingly threaten future livelihoods.
Shibaura Mechatronics Group operates with consideration for the environment. As a responsible corporation that respects and responds to the demands of society, we tackle sustainability issues head on. As a Group, we think about the measures we can take, and accept the responsibility of integrating those measures into our business practices.

Shibaura Mechatronics Group and CSR

Corporate Social Responsibility, in the form of “company public policy” and “integrating ways of tackling social and environmental problems into business” is becoming increasingly important. Until now Shibaura Mechatronics Group has been engaged in providing manufacturing companies with manufacturing equipment for products such as semiconductors, flat panel displays and optical disks, and in this sense we have played a part in the manufacture of these products. The introduction of semiconductors, flat panel displays and optical disks has made our lives much more convenient and enriched society, and in this way I believe we can reasonably say that we have made a definite contribution. Now I believe that, through CSR activities, we should contribute to society by taking the technologies that we have cultivated in our business and expanding them into the areas of the environment and energy.

Initiatives in Response to Environmental Problems

The sharp increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases such as CO2 is widely believed to be a major cause of climate change, a realization that has inspired various approaches to the control greenhouse gas emissions. However, as we continue with our social lives and activities, it is important for us to end our reliance on oil and make the transition towards a low carbon society. Achieving this will require the development of technology that uses solar power to generate electricity, and along with this rechargeable batteries that allow us to store generated electricity will be essential. ?We are confident that the equipment manufacturing technology we have cultivated in our business activities can contribute to the development of these products, and to technologies that will open up the future. By making use of our core technologies, including our bonding technology, sputtering technology, laser technology and automation technology, we have started to develop and supply our customers with solar cell manufacturing equipment and rechargeable battery manufacturing equipment.
In respect of manufacturing industry, Shibaura Mechatronics Group is promoting the operating philosophy of “do not use” and “do not emit.” In addition to doing all we can to reduce CO2 emissions resulting from our own business activities, we have also been working on bringing to market the kind of equipment that allows our customers to produce less CO2 as they manufacture their products.

Initiatives for the future

The demands of our customers and the demands of society are changing on a daily basis. Initial thinking on CSR in Japan focused on “contributions to society,” “environmental measures” and “corporate ethics.” Today the scope is wider, and embraces deeper concerns: “solving the various environmental issues faced by our generation; taking a leading role as a corporation, both in business activities and in working with stakeholders, to promote specific activities that aim to achieve a sustainable society”. More recently, there have been calls for companies to observe the combined concept of “compatibility between economic activities and the environment.” Shibaura Mechatronics Group is expanding its operations overseas and in the future we also intend to develop CSR activities that bring benefits to countries in Europe and Asia. Towards this we must take full advantage of the autumn 2010 launch of ISO26000, international guidelines on social responsibility, and make sure that our CSR activities meet the needs of this age of globalization.
Shibaura Mechatronics Group remains firmly committed to continuing business activities and CSR activities in a manner that closely reflects the changes in society and that respond to the needs of the age. In this report we have brought together accounts of our company’s CSR activities. We hope that many of you will have the chance to read it, and we look forward to receiving your frank opinions and comments.