Kobe Steel unit loses JIS certification for some products

October 26, 2017

Kobe Steel Ltd. said Thursday a subsidiary has lost the Japanese Industrial Standards certification for some products due to product quality data falsification.

Kobe Steel, the third-biggest steelmaker in Japan, also said it has found a total of four new suspected cases of data tampering at some group companies, including the parent itself.

The JIS certification was removed from copper and copper alloy seamless tubes made at a plant of the subsidiary, Kobelco & Materials Copper Tube Co., in Hadano, Kanagawa Prefecture, south of Tokyo.Kobe Steel President Hiroya Kawasaki explains recent scandal on the company during a press conference in Tokyo on October 26, 2017. After markets closed, the embattled firm said it lost a Japanese industrial standards certificate for certain products at one of its factories and warned there could be more sites affected. Through a reexamination after the scandal emerged early this month, a private JIS certification body has concluded that the tubes shipped by the plant did not meet JIS requirements.

Kobe Steel also said probes so far have found there are no products that must be recalled or whose use must be stopped immediately due to product quality problems.

The Kobe Steel group shipped products whose data were falsified to a total of 525 companies. So far, safety has been confirmed for products shipped to 437 of the affected clients, Kobe Steel said, adding that the probes are still going on.

"I again extend my deep apology for causing trouble," Hiroya Kawasaki, president of the parent company, told a news conference.

Kawasaki also said his company hopes to restore the JIS certification for the tube products soon.

Only last year, Kobe Steel saw a different group company stripped of the JIS certification for part of its products due to data falsification.

Kobe Steel has so far conducted investigations into the latest scandal mainly through an internal team. The probes will be taken over by a new investigative panel of outsiders set up on Thursday. Jiji Press



TOKYO- Kobe Steel President Hiroya Kawasaki explains recent scandal on the company during a press conference in Tokyo on October 26, 2017.

After markets closed, the embattled firm said it lost a Japanese industrial standards certificate for certain products at one of its factories and warned there could be more sites affected. Jiji Press