Excessive quality standards behind makers’ scandals

December 26, 2017

Tokyo- Excessive quality standards from the product design stage are behind inspection data manipulation scandals at Kobe Steel Ltd. and other companies, business management expert Takao Nakazawa has said.

"Designers draw up immaculate product plans, hoping to attain perfection to an unnecessary extent," said the Fukuyama University professor well versed in small business management.

"I can see they want to make themselves different from other companies, but it takes time, effort and cost (to follow their designs)," he said in a recent interview. "It's time to review the practice and ease the standards."

Kobe Steel, Mitsubishi Materials Ltd. and some other manufacturers tampered with quality data and shipped products that did not fully meet client requirements.

It is wrong to view the scandals at individual companies as representing deterioration in the country's manufacturing industry at large, Nakazawa said, noting that Japan has 270,000 manufacturing companies in total.

Product quality standards sought in the country "are not as low as those developed by the International Organization for Standardization," he said.

Toyota Motor Corp.'s standards are so tough that about 70 percent of European-made vehicles would fail them, Nakazawa continued.

Asked how to resolve the problem of excessive standards, Nakazawa proposed that manufacturers raise prices to reflect the unessential elements, as the recent manpower shortages in the country have made it easy for many to carry out price increases.

Buyers would then ask makers to remove unnecessary features to save costs, he said.

"With the current prices and delivery deadlines, you can't make something perfect. Concessions must be made somewhere," he also stated.

Regarding Kobe Steel's data manipulation, Nakazawa said its products may have reached certain levels of quality. But that does not mean the company can break its promises to clients, he added.

Nakazawa observed that the company suffered a huge loss of trust after it dodged inspections and betrayed clients on many occasions. Jiji Press