October 13, 2021

Notice Regarding Investment to Increase Production Capacity at Ariake Plant

The capital investment will enable the Ariake Plant (Nagano Prefecture) to increase production capacity of Harmonic Drive® strain wave gearing devices from 150,000 units/month to 220,000 units/month by August 2022.

Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. announced that it will increase the production capacity of Harmonic Drive® strain wave gears to meet the continuous demand for industrial robot and semiconductor manufacturing equipment as well as to meet rapidly growing demand for industrial machinery and automotive applications. With this new investment, Harmonic Drive will be able to strengthen its competitiveness by increasing the stable supply capacity to customers, as well as by improving quality, delivery time, and production efficiency.

The company will invest approximately JPY6.5bn between March and August 2022 in its Ariake Plant (Nagano Prefecture). The new production line at the Ariake factory will implement more “factory automation” to increase production efficiency. The breakdown of the capacity increase (70,000 units/month) is 40,000 units/month for the industrial machinery sector and 30,000 units/month for the automotive industry. In the previous mid-term plan, which ended in March 2021, construction of the Ariake Plant was completed in September 2019 in anticipation of growing demand for precision speed reducers.

Outline of Capital Investment

Ariake Factory Overview Site area: 51,600 m2 (555,415 ft2) Floor area of main building: 21,819 m2 (234,858 ft2 ) Completed on Sep 2019 (main building)