6 domestic and 2 overseas offices

Electricity is 100% renewable energy

─ Each company is promoting the introduction of renewable energy toward the realization of carbon neutrality.

Kato Yes. Our company uses 100% renewable energy to supply electricity to 6 domestic offices and 2 overseas offices.

We were one of the first to popularize energy-saving housing with solar panels in the housing business "Sekisui Heim" as well as in the chemical business, so there are currently more than 210,000 customers who have installed solar panels.

Since FIT (Fixed Price Purchase System) will end in sequence for such customers, the electricity generated in the daytime cannot be used at night without a storage battery, so we purchase surplus electricity from customers who have graduated from FIT. Is directed to our own production plants.

The electricity generated at home is in a state of competition, but customers who have graduated from FIT, as well as the purchase price, are sympathetic to Sekisui Heim's trust and our ESG initiatives. Since I have a contract, I think that the number of contracts will continue to increase.

There are some business partners who only buy things from factories with 100% renewable energy, but we have a system in place to deal with that.

─ How are you working to develop leaders as work style reforms progress?

Kato Even in the long-term vision, "challenge" is mentioned as a keyword. Think about what your department and what you want to be in 5 or 10 years, and take a step to close the gap with the current situation. We position it as a "challenge."

In an uncertain era, if you affirm the current state of your work or business, you will die instead of growing. That is why we must keep changing.

I want you to take on the challenge with such a healthy sense of crisis. Immediately after taking office as president, I have been continuing the "Vision Caravan," which speaks directly to employees online, in order to establish that as a corporate culture. In some cases, various people from each department participate, and as a next leader, we ask people in the next leader class to ask more and more what they want to hear.

We are also reforming the system that encourages challenges and the personnel system that rewards those who challenge. It is a personnel system reform that even young people can be selected as those who have produced results. Challenges are accompanied by failures, so a culture of not blaming failures is being fostered.

The person who has done it will become the next leader while having them take on the challenge. I hope that leaders will grow one after another in the medium-term and long-term vision.

─ It is said that you have gained the power to earn, but Korona-ka was an opportunity to share a sense of crisis.

Kato That's right. Due to the Korona-ka, the way of life has changed drastically, and I think there are some that suddenly stopped selling and some that sold on the contrary.

In that sense, existing products may become obsolete after a certain amount of life or changes in the world. Therefore, we must continue to develop new applications and fields. If there are more products that disappear, it will be negative, so I would like you to work with a sense of crisis. If I thought it was safe in the current situation, I would die in no time.

There is a healthy sense of crisis in the base of the challenge, and I want them to review it on a zero basis without affirming the current situation. I will change everything that should be changed. If we do not do this thoroughly, we will not be able to achieve our long-term vision of sales of 2 trillion yen.

Now that the overseas ratio is about 25%, we are trying to raise it to 50%. If you want to expand overseas, you have to keep up with the sense of speed and the speed of change overseas.

For example, when I was the president of high-performance plastics, when I looked at the product composition of industrial tapes 10 years ago and now, there were not half of the products 10 years ago.

If the current situation is affirmative and only that product is done, the sales of the business division will be halved, the product will become obsolete, and the profit will decrease further. The fact that the company is growing to the right now is because we are releasing products that meet new needs one after another.

I believe that the company as a whole must demonstrate its strengths and constantly change.

(Interviewer, Fumiko Kitagawa)

Is it rubber? Is it metal? "Metallic rubber" from Mitsubishi Materials

Keita Kato

Kato / Keita

Born in January 1958. After graduating from the Faculty of Engineering, Kyoto University in 1980, joined Sekisui Chemical Co., Ltd. in April of the same year. In 2008, he concurrently served as Executive Officer, General Manager of Intermediate Membrane Division, High Performance Plastics Company, 2011, General Manager of New Business Promotion Department, and 2013, General Manager of Development Research Institute. March 2014 Managing Executive Officer, President of High Performance Plastics Company, June of the same year Director, 2015 Managing Director, 19 years Representative Director, Corporate Strategy Department Manager, ESG Management Promotion Department Manager, New Business Development Department Manager, March 2008 Representative Director President, President Executive Officer