Japan's Canon Inc said on Monday it plans to build one of the largest photocopier plants in China in July next year to shift manufacturing of lower-end models from Japan and increase sales in China and abroad.
Canon would become the latest of the top three Japanese copier makers to make and sell photocopiers in China, joining rivals Ricoh Co and Fuji Xerox Co in a market with estimated annual sales at 200,000 units and forecast to grow at an annual rate of at least 10 percent.
A Canon spokesman said Japan's biggest camera and printer maker would set up a wholly-owned subsidiary in September and purchase a 230,000 square metre site near Shanghai in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, to be used for the plant.
The spokesman said the company will shift production at its Toride and Ami plants in Ibaraki Prefecture, located west of Tokyo, to the China plant.
Canon also plans next year to end its contract entrusting photocopier production to a subsidiary of Italy's Olivetti SpA
The first construction phase of the plant will likely cost around 10 billion yen (US$83.95 million), the spokesman said, and Canon plans to employ about 3,500 workers there by 2004, with monthly output projected at around 20,000 copiers.
(China Daily 06/04/2001)
