|
They were winners of last year’s Kyoto Prizes, a function of the Inamori Foundation, not as well known as the Nobel Prize, but destined to become more important if the world matures to embrace its emotional and psychological development as much as it values its scientific and technology achievements. At least that’s the hope of the founder of the Kyoto Prizes and the foundation that bears his name. Kazuo Inamori, chairman emeritus of Kyocera Corp. and its 3,200-plus employees of Kyocera International in San Diego and Tijuana, says he selected USD for the inaugural Kyoto Laureate Symposium because USD President Alice Hayes was “more passionate” than the other suitors who’ve approached him over the years. Had the inaugural Kyoto Laureate Symposium been held a year ago, it might have been a happier time for Inamori, although somewhat awkward since the Kroc Institute had not yet been built. But this year has been a difficult time for the semi-retired entrepreneur watching a multi-billion-dollar enterprise contract along with the rest of the telecommunications and electronics industries. Kyocera Corp., the Kyoto-based parent traded on the New York Stock Exchange, is heading for a year ending March 31 with sales down more than 20 percent to roughly 1.03 trillion yen (about $7.5 billion), a decline aggravated by a weaker exchange rate. Profit may reach 27.5 billion yen, down from 219 billion yen a year ago. “Bookings have fallen to less than half of their peak, but I’d classify this as a short-term problem,” Inamori tells the San Diego Metropolitan. “This should be over in a year.” Later, he allowed for “no basis for specifically” predicting improvement within a year, rather general observations that the “phone business is now showing some sign of reviving. In semiconductors, there’s also some hope; PC sales are up. For optical fiber, we believe there is plenty of inventory and facilities are not at capacity. In one year, we’ll have to expand.”
Kyocera Wireless almost entirely operates in San Diego, a $1 billion a year mobile phone manufacturing business. Also active locally is Kyocera’s microelectronic packaging, the making of ceramic housings for computer chips, which does more than $1 billion globally, though not entirely from San Diego. Also in San Diego, Kyocera manufactures optoelectronic interconnect components, the devices that plug optical fibers into each other and into other components and data transmitters. In Tijuana, Kyocera assembles a variety of products. About 465 of Kyocera’s 3,200 local employees work south of the border. For more background on the Kyoto Laureates, check out kyotoprize.org. Oh, Walter Munk, the Scripps oceanographer, was at last month’s USD ceremony because he won the Kyoto Prize in 1999. No wonder she couldn’t resist.
|
Other than the romantic winking going on from Walter Munk, on stage, to his wife Judith, in the audience, as if no one were watching, a rather distinguished ceremony was presented by the University of San Diego’s Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice to honor five of the most brilliant minds on Earth – Izuo Hayashi, Zhores Ivanovich Alferov, Morton Panish, Gyorgy Ligeti and John Maynard Smith, who was absent due to illness.
Home | Info | Cover Story | About Us | Back Issues | Search
