Tokyo-The Yokohama Rubber Co., Ltd., today announced that it would merge the operation of Yokohama Hydex Co., a wholly owned subsidiary, as of October 1, 2004. Conventionally, Yokohama Rubber and Yokohama Hydex shared a hose business, with the former being responsible for hose production and the latter producing metal couplings, assembling them with the hose and distributing the assembled hoses. In April of this year, however, Yokohama Rubber decided to integrate the operations of the two companies in order to improve business efficiency by introducing a unified chain of command.

In order to integrate functions of the two companies as of October 1, 2004, Yokohama Rubber will create a Hoses and Coupling Division, under which a Hoses and Coupling Sales Department, Hoses and Coupling Engineering Dept., Ibaraki Plant, Hiratsuka East Plant, Nagano Plant, and Hoses and Coupling Quality Assurance Department will be placed. The current branch office functions of Yokohama Hydex in Tokyo and Nagoya will be integrated with MB Tokyo Office and MB Nagoya Office of Yokohama Rubber, respectively. The current Yokohama Hydex branch office functions in Osaka and Hiroshima are transferred to the new Hoses and Coupling Sales Dept. Also, Hydex Tokyo Co. and YH America, Inc (U.S.A.), both of which are the subsidiaries of Yokohama Hydex, will become 100% subsidiaries of Yokohama Rubber. With the business integration, current Yokohama Hydex employees will be transferred to Yokohama Rubber.

Yokohama Hydex was founded in 1973 as a joint venture company between Yokohama Rubber and a U.S. company for the assembly of the hose and metal couplings. In 1996, the joint venture company became a 100% subsidiary of Yokohama Rubber and changed its name to Yokohama Hydex. In 2003, it recorded sales of 21.5 billion yen.

After the business integration, inquiries should be directed to:
Hoses and Coupling Division
The Yokohama Rubber Co., Ltd.
36-11, Shimbashi 5 chome, Minato-ku, Tokyo 105-8685
Tel. 03-5400-2771 Fax. 5400-2304