Seiko to make watches in Johor

By ZAZALI MUSA IN JOHOR BARU

SEIKO Epson Corp will be transferring its high-grade watch production facilities in Nagano, Japan, to wholly-owned subsidiary Epson Precision (Johor) Sdn Bhd (EPJ). 

EPJ managing director Morikazu Kato said the transfer, to be done in stages, would start in May 2004 and probably be completed by March the following year. 

He attributed the decision to move its high-grade watch making facilities to Johor to the large pool of highly skilled employees in Malaysia. 

“Initially, we also looked at China, but decided on Johor as the former did not offer readily highly skilled factory operators as in Malaysia,” Kato said. 

He said the relocation reflected the company's commitment to stay put in Johor for many years to come, dismissing talk that EPJ would relocate to China.  

He was speaking to reporters at the launch yesterday of the company's annual Safety, Health and Environment Week, held at its plant in Jalan Kempas Baru near here. 

Kato said the high-grade watch making operations would be housed at its existing complete watch casing plant at Jalan Kempas, the largest in-house production base in Seiko Epson Asian's network outside Japan. 

He said the Johor plant was chosen because it had proven capability in producing high-precision watch parts, machine metal parts, rotor magnets and printer shafts. 

Another plant located on the 10-acre site owned by the company is involved in metal parts making printer-related parts and components, also the largest outside Japan. 

Kato said the high-grade watches would be manufactured solely for export to three major markets – China, Hong Kong and Japan – with prices starting from RM2,500 per watch. 

He said the high-grade watch activity would contribute RM30mil in revenue to EPJ in the first year of operations. EPJ recorded turnover of RM58mil in 2002.