Introducing 140 years of Toyobo history.

On June 26th, 1914, Toyobo Co., Ltd. was established through a merger of Mie Boseki and Osaka Boseki. Instead of a purchase acquisition, both companies agreed that the merger should be an incorporation merger, and chose to establish a new company. The merger between the two companies was implemented under the mediation of Eiichi Shibusawa, who held the position of senior adviser in both companies.
As a result of the merger, Toyobo became a large company with an initial capitalization of 14.25 million yen, 440,000 spinning machines, 20,000 yarn twisters, and over 10,000 looms. Takeo Yamanobe from Osaka Boseki was appointed as president, and Denshichi Ito from Mie Boseki was appointed as vice-president.
Masatada Okamura, who was one of Yamanobe's closest associates from the very start of Osaka Boseki said, “Toyobo was named by Shibusawa, and contained his aspirations for “…Toyobo to become one of the largest textiles companies in Asia.””.

* ”Toyo” means the East, and “bo” is an abbreviation for “Boseki” that means spinning in Japanese.

In March 1931, Toyobo merged with Osaka Goudobo to create one of the largest spinning companies in the world.

When it was first established, Toyobo's Head Office was at the Yokkaichi Plant in Mie prefecture. Now our head office is in Osaka prefecture where is about 100km away from there.

In 1955, Toyobo became the first Japanese company in the cotton industry to expand overseas by establishing Toyobo do Brasil Industria Textil Ltda.
At that time, Brazil was undergoing political change, but it had a stable social life, raw cotton could be procured locally, and the market was expanding.
Meanwhile, in the same year Kureha Boseki (which later merged with Toyobo) expanded into El Salvador and established IUSA (Industrias Unidas, S.A.). This was at a time when there was still no Japanese Embassy in El Salvador.

Saburo Hirao (who later became vice-president of Toyobo) poured his heart and soul into, and also risked his life in expanding Kureha Boseki into El Salvador.
Hirao died suddenly in 1973 when returning to Japan via El Salvador from a business trip to Brazil. In praise of his outstanding achievements, Toyobo donated the construction costs to build the “Hirao Saburo Park”. You can often see many families enjoying a relaxing afternoon in the park.

Toyobo had been researching synthetic fibers since before WWII. However, our expansion into synthetic fibers started with the development of acrylic fibers in 1956 through Japan Exlan Co., Ltd., which was jointly managed with Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd. This came from the idea that, “within the natural fibers, silk can be replaced with artificial silk or polyamide, and cotton can be replaced with staple fibers or vinylon. It is essential that an acrylic that has a similar texture to wool be introduced”, and technology was introduced from ACC company in the United States.

In September 1962, permission to use technologies from Goodyear was approved, and production at the Iwakuni plant started in May 1964.

In April 1966, Toyobo and Kureha Boseki merged. Capital after the merger was 17.3 billion yen, and the workforce exceeded 30,000. The new company had the largest number of cotton spinning machines, cotton fiber looms, and wool spinning machines in Japan, with the addition of a polyamide plant. As a result, it achieved yearly sales of 130 billion yen.

After WWII, Toyobo concentrated on becoming a giant synthetic fiber company. However, even as we followed that path, opportunities for new operations were being developed, principally in the plastics and biochemistry businesses.
Our plastics business was born from our accumulation of technologies related to high polymer chemistry that were developed within the synthetic fiber business

Our biochemistry business was born from our pulp business. In 1972, Toyobo developed the "Uricolor400" uric acid measurement testing chemical using the enzyme method. In 1975, a policy that placed the utmost importance on diagnostic pharmaceuticals and enzymes for diagnostic pharmaceuticals was established, and we further strengthened our research and development structure.

On May 3rd, 1982, Toyobo marked 100 years since its predecessor organization was established in Sangen'ya village, Osaka. President Osamu Uno called upon the employees to, “protect what should be protected, discard what should be discarded, and start what should be started from everything we have accumulated over the past 100 years, and to move towards the realization of a new vision”. Toyobo established the “Toyobo Biotechnology Foundation”.

Consolidated net sales in the fiscal year ending in March 2003 were 376.4 billion yen, of which 183 billion yen was generated by fiber operations, and 193.4 billion yen was generated by non-fiber operations. Non-fiber operations include such businesses as films, engineering plastics and electrical materials, many of which continue to be Toyobo's main businesses.

In April 2008, Toyobo STC Co., Ltd. was established through the integration of Toyobo's development and sales departments in its textiles business with the high-function products division and textile division of Shinko Sangyo Co., Ltd., a Toyobo group trading company. As a development-oriented global trading company, its core activities are the development of overseas markets, and the strengthening and expansion of specialty business such as films and functional polymers, industrial materials and life science.