NTN Creates New Joint Venture for Turning Large Bearings

NTN Creates New Joint Venture for Turning Large Bearings NTN corporation (NTN), with Marubeni-Itochu Steel, Inc. and Kurita Inabe Corporation, will establish NTN HAKUI CORPORATION in the city of Hakui, Ishikawa Prefecture. It will perform the turning process for large bearings. Demand has been rapidly increasing for large bearings as a result of strong growth in sectors such as wind turbines. 1. Purpose of the new company The demand from business and governmental bodies for large-scale wind turbine facilities has been rapidly increasing as the use of natural energy has been strongly promoted to preserve the global environment. The demand for leading-edge medical equipment such as high-speed CT scanners has also been growing. Thus, demand has increased for production of large bearings, necessary for such facilities and equipment. NTN's new large bearing turning operation in Hakui allows full-scale production -- covering forging, heat-treating and turning processes, together with the global expertise in forging techniques of Taira Forging. NTN will achieve further productivity improvements by reducing production leadtime and costs. 2. Schedule NTN will establish the joint venture company in March 2007 and start operation in August 2007. The operation will start with about 15 employees and then expand to become the core of the large bearing business, one of NTN's strategic products. 3. Outline of the new company (1) Company name: NTN HAKUI CORPORATION (2) Location: 32, 2 Mitsuya-cho, Hakui, Ishikawa, Japan (3) Business lines: Manufacture and sales of various types of bearings, components and machine parts (4) Capitalization: 200 million yen (5) Investors: NTN80% Marubeni-Itochu Steel Inc.14% Kurita Inabe Corporation6% (6) Total investment: Approx. 1,300 million yen (7) Site area: Approx. 27,700m2 (8) Total floor space: Approx. 3,700m2 (9) Employees: Approx. 15 (10) Construction start: April 2007 (projected) (11) Operation Start: August 2007 (projected) 4. Outline of Investors NTN Corporation Head Office: 3-17, 1-chome, Kyomachibori, Nishi-ku, Osaka, Japan Representative: Yasunobu Suzuki, President & Representative Director Established: March 1934 (operation started March 1918) Capitalization: 39.6 billion yen Employees: 14,361 (consolidated), 5,442 (standalone) Sales: 434.8 billion yen (consolidated), 317.3 billion yen (standalone) - F/Y ended March 2006 - Business lines: Manufacture and sales of bearings, constant velocity joints and precision equipment Marubeni-Itochu Steel Inc. Head Office: 4 - 1, 1-chome, Nipponbashi, Chuuou-ku, Tokyo, Japan Representative: Tsunekatsu Yonezawa, President & Representative Director Established: October 2001 Capitalization: 30 billion yen Employees: 7,600 (consolidated), 711 (standalone) Sales: 1,697.5 billion yen (consolidated), 1,010.5 billion yen (standalone) - F/Y ended March 2006 - Business lines: Domestic sales, export & import, third-country trade and processing trade Investors: ITOCHU Corporation (50%), Marubeni CORPORATION (50%) Kurita Inabe Corporation Head Office: 546 Nakayama, Hokusei-cho, Inabe, Mie, Japan Representative: Masayuki Mouri, President & Representative Director Established: March 2006 Capitalization: 150 million yen Employees: 30 Business lines: Manufacture of various bearings and components, and auto parts Investors: Kurita-Seiko Co., Ltd. (70%), NTN (30%)