Asō (company)
| KK Asō
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|---|---|
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| legal form | Kabushiki kaisha (joint stock company) |
| founding | 1872 |
| Seat | Iizuka , Fukuoka Prefecture , Japan |
| management |
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| Number of employees | 10,654 (April 2016) |
| sales | 256.8 billion yen (2016) |
| Branch | Conglomerate : building materials, real estate and medicine |
| Website | www.aso-group.jp |
KK Asō ( Japanese 株式会社 麻 生 , English Aso Corporation ) is a Japanese conglomerate that operates under the Asō Group brand , primarily in the fields of building materials, real estate and medicine. He is based in Iizuka in the Fukuoka prefecture .
The management of the company has Yutaka Asō (Japanese 麻 生 泰 Asō Yutaka ), the younger brother of the politician Tarō Asō and older brother of the Princess Tomohito of Mikasa .
history
The company's history goes back to the entrepreneur and politician Asō Takichi ( 麻 生 太 吉 ), who began operating a coal mine in 1872. He participated in the establishment of a bank, a railroad company and an electricity company. In 1911 he opened a hospital for miners, the Asō Tankō Byōin (today: Iizuka Byōin ). In 1918 his previous sole proprietorship was converted into a joint stock company as Asō Shōten KK . After Asō Takichi's death in 1933, his grandson, Asō Takakichi ( 麻 生 太 賀 吉 ), son-in-law of the future Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru , took over the management of the company.
Asō began manufacturing cement in 1934 . In 1939 the first Asō- Juku ("Paukschule") opened; today the company operates 12 specialized schools in Fukuoka , Kitakyūshū and Iizuka. After the Second World War , further subsidiaries were added, especially in the building materials industry (Asō Cement as a spin-off, Asō Concrete, Asō Foam Crete). In 1966, the parent company Asō KK was re-established with the creation of the independent Asō Cement KK. 1973 the Asō Iizuka Golf Club was opened.
In 1973, when Tarō Asō, Takakichi's eldest son, took over the deputy management, the handover to the next generation began. In 1976 he moved up to the top as chairman of the board (shachō) , but in 1979, after his election to parliament, left the leadership to his brother Yutaka. 1980 Asō Takakichi gave up the more representative position of chairman (kaichō) .
In 2001, the French building materials manufacturer Lafarge acquired around 40% of the capital in Asō Cement, and the subsidiary has since been called Asō Lafarge Cement KK (Lafarge Aso Cement Co., Ltd.).
Use of forced labor in World War II
During Tarō Asō's tenure as foreign minister in 2006, former forced laborers of the Yoshikuma coal mine in Fukuoka Prefecture of Asō Kōgyō ( 麻 生 鉱 業 , English Aso Mining ) - later part of Asō Cement - demanded an apology and financial compensation. Tarō Asō only issued a public statement after taking office as Prime Minister in October 2008, in which he admitted that Allied prisoners of war had worked in the mine. In December 2008, during a meeting of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Sangiin (House of Lords), documents were presented to the Japanese government confirming that 197 Australian, 101 British and two Dutch slave laborers had been used in the coal mine in 1945. The democratic deputies Yukihisa Fujita requested an investigation into whether the forced laborers employed in violation of the Geneva Conventions had been mistreated.
In addition to the Allied prisoners of war, an estimated total of 12,000 Korean forced laborers were recruited for Asō between 1939 and 1945. While many were able to escape from work in the mines, a police report from 1944 shows almost 8,000 Korean recruits at Asō Kōgyō and over 50 deaths. Most Korean forced recruits in Japan were never paid or compensated for their work.
subsidiary company
In 2016, the Asō Group comprised 84 companies, most of them based in Fukuoka Prefecture.
owner
The largest single shareholders of Asō are Asō Juku with 15.22%, Yutaka Asō with 5.52% and Sumitomo Shintaku Ginkō with 5.13% of the shares.
Web links
- Official website (Japanese, English)
- Asō Corporation website (Japanese)
- Asō Lafarge Cement KK / Lafarge Aso Cement Co., Ltd. website (Japanese, English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d K.K. Asō: 麻 生 グ ル ー プ の 概要 ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Japanese). Retrieved March 25, 2017
- ↑ Gakkō Hōjin Asō Juku: 福岡 の 麻 生 専 門 学校 グ ル ー プ - 福岡 県 下 に 12 校 の 総 合 専 門 学校 （（福岡 ・ 北九州 ・ 飯 塚） ( Memento from October 22, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ KK Asō: 会 社 沿革
- ↑ Aso Group: 麻 生 の 歴 史
- ↑ Christopher Reed: Family of POW makes appeal to Aso 'honor'. In: The Japan Times. June 20, 2006, accessed December 27, 2008 .
- ^ William Underwood: WWII forced labor issue dogs Aso, Japanese firms. In: The Japan Times. October 28, 2008, accessed December 22, 2008 .
- ↑ Masami Itō: It's official: Aso family mine used POW labor. In: The Japan Times. December 19, 2008, accessed December 22, 2008 .
- ^ William Underwood: The Aso Mining Company in World War II: History and Japan's Would-Be Premier. In: Japan Focus. June 10, 2007, accessed December 29, 2008 .
- ↑ KK Asō: グ ル ー プ 企業 一 覧
- ↑ Tōyō Keizai, Asō Foam Crete KK: 親 会 社 等 の 決算 に 関 す る お 知 ら せ ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
