Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd.

IWATA, July 16, 2024 - Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. (Tokyo: 7272) announces it has signed a service agreement with YL Forest Co., Ltd. (hereinafter, "YLF"), a company headquartered in Fukuoka City that is implementing its proprietary mangrove planting method in the Republic of Indonesia. Going forward, funding provided to YLF by the Company will go toward launching a new mangrove planting project in the country's province of South Sulawesi. The agreement entrusts YLF with silvo-fishery-based mangrove planting work over a three-year period, aimed at contributing to biodiversity, carbon neutrality, and preventing marine pollution. Through YLF's work, Yamaha Motor will plant 215 hectares (approximately 370,000 trees) of mangroves as well as maintain operations in the project area. YLF conducts afforestation work using its own version of silvo-fishery for mangrove planting. Silvo-fishery (a portmanteau of "silviculture" and "fishery") is a method that yields the benefits of both mangrove reforestation and aquaculture regeneration. This combination not only contributes to sustainable forest management but also to improving the livelihoods of local residents through sustainable aquaculture paired with the natural environment. Furthermore, mangrove forests store large amounts of carbon underground, making them an important channel for blue carbon.* One of the four items in the Company's Marine Long-Term Vision is "Towards a future with a greater ocean than the current one of today." As a marine industry leader, Yamaha Motor will continue working to preserve the world's beautiful waters in order to achieve this goal. *Carbon absorbed into coastal and marine ecosystems that accumulates in the biomass and soil below it. #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #collaboration #environment #preservation #silvofishery #Indonesia #forests #aquaculture #carbon #carbonneutral #bluecarbon

=== Days Gone By===   Days Spent with Cars – 7. A Request from Toyota Motor    Shortly after our previous business partnership ended, President Kawakami began to approach Toyota Motor. The first step was for management of both companies to meet. Vice President Eiji Toyoda (at the time), Managing Executive Officer Shoichiro Toyoda (at the time) and a number of other Toyota executives visited Yamaha and met for discussions with President Kawakami at Seifuso, the company’s private inn for visiting dignitaries. I was also asked to attend and explain the content and details of the car-related work we had done up to that point. I can still clearly remember how nervous I was.    Toyota likely wanted to ascertain whether or not Yamaha could really handle future automobile development work—some of which would involve handling confidential information—and there was also our business partnership history to consider. I have no doubt that Toyota visiting us that day was more of a preliminary investigation into what level of relationship they could have with Yamaha.    Toyota later asked President Kawakami to visit, so he, Managing Executive Officer Naka, Executive Officer Ono and I traveled to Toyota’s headquarters. Vice President Toyoda, Managing Director Saito, Managing Executive Officer Toyoda and Executive Officer Inagawa were waiting for us when we arrived. It was on this occasion that Toyota officially expressed interest in having Yamaha Motor work for them.    <continues>    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #cars #automotive #manufacturing #engineering #history 

===What the Japanese Bayberry Trees Have Seen===   21. Business Plans  <continued>    As for sales, we figured that if we could get Nippon Gakki’s branch offices across the country to help, we would be able to somehow reach our initial sales targets. We had to try and finish the first ten prototypes that we were working on by October 5th, and then try to add an additional 20 complete prototypes by mid-November.    During a road test held on September 11th, the No. 2 prototype completed 387 km in a single day, indicating that it would take about 26 days for us to complete the full 10,000 km test.    On the 13th, the president issued some guidelines as to how we would move forward for the foreseeable future, and we were forced to alter the plans we had made at the meeting just a few days ago.    Among his thoughts were:  – I want to make the formal announcement by mid-September.  – There’s no need for the extra prototypes; I want production to start right away.  – October will be for making preparations for production and assembly starting in November.  – I want to start sales on December 1st.    Simply based on his scheduling, we thought most of these goals would be essentially impossible to meet. However, in retrospect, this is what got us fired up, scratching our heads and working together to make it happen. In the end, what we thought was “impossible” became possible. We experienced this pattern many, many times after that day.    Photo: A design blueprint for the YA-1's piston    <ends>    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #motorcycles #racing #manufacturing #engineering #history #design

IWATA, July 10, 2024 - Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. (Tokyo: 7272) is pleased to announce that it will build a new verification testing facility equipped with a melting furnace and heat treatment furnace using hydrogen gas at its Morimachi Factory (Morimachi, Shuchi-gun, Shizuoka Prefecture). From 2025, we will begin development and verification of technologies and techniques for melting aluminum alloy using hydrogen gas, as well as comprehensive verification testing for requisite facilities, equipment, and more. By the end of 2026, we plan to complete the development of technologies for melting aluminum alloy and heat-treating cast parts using hydrogen gas and to gradually implement them at our domestic and international casting factories from 2027 onward. This verification testing is part of Yamaha Motor's efforts to minimize Scope 1*¹ CO₂ emissions across the life cycles of our products. In the manufacture of cast parts for motorcycles, outboard motors, and other products, natural gas and other fossil fuels are currently used to provide the thermal energy required for melting aluminum alloys. In our search for alternative energy sources, we judged that electrification is not suited for the melting process in terms of energy efficiency, as it requires a large amount of heat, so we turned our attention to hydrogen energy, which Yamaha Motor is already studying as an option for reducing Scope 3*² emissions. The verification testing itself will include examining the influence hydrogen gas has on quality and developing temperature control techniques using hydrogen burners. We are also considering the introduction of equipment for producing green hydrogen and methanation equipment*³ (through joint research with Shizuoka University) to produce e-methane without needing external heat sources. Yamaha Motor will work to develop equipment for producing hydrogen gas at low cost as well as technologies for capturing and reusing the CO₂ in exhaust gases. Yamaha Motor, in line with its Yamaha Motor Group Environmental Plan 2050, is working toward being carbon neutral*⁴ throughout all of its supply chains, including the company's business activities by 2050. Furthermore, with Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions, we have accelerated our plans to achieve carbon neutrality at our manufacturing sites--including at group companies--by 2035 and are ramping up our efforts to that end. *1 Emissions produced as a direct result of business activities (product manufacturing and fuel combustion) *2 Emissions produced from the Company's value chain, e.g., product use, deliveries, transportation *3 Equipment for producing e-methane by using a catalyst to create a CO₂ and hydrogen reaction *4 Emissions as a direct result of business activities (Scope 1 and 2) and emissions outside of these (Scope 3)

Next in our series of interviews with the Communication Plaza’s restoration team is Ikuo Nakamura, a former road racer and long-time Yamaha test rider. He is a relative newcomer to the team, but brings with him a wealth of wrenching know-how and experience he honed maintaining his racebike back in the day. Still, he finds new lessons hidden in the engineering of the old Yamahas he works hard to restore today.    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #classic #motorcycles #restoration #museum #preservation #design #industrialdesign #history #manufacturing #engineering #technology #craftsmanship 

=== Days Gone By===   Days Spent with Cars – 6. A Sports Car Known to Few    While working on these projects, our personal relationships with that carmaker grew closer and more frequent, and as we consistently built more and more parts and prototypes, they began to recognize Yamaha’s technological expertise. Then, it came—a full-on joint development project to create a new sports car from the ground up. We were ecstatic; we had finally returned to building sports cars!    The specifications for the car were as follows:  It would be powered by the 2,000cc, DOHC Yamaha YX-80 engine and use the chassis from an existing sports car, but with the suspension redesigned for improved high-speed driving. The styling would be handled by a designer from Europe working for the carmaker on commission at the time. His avant-garde design included pop-up headlights, a first for a car from Japan.    While the carmaker handled the overall layout, Yamaha worked out the details of the design based on it and built the prototypes. Because the overall layout was well thought out and nearly finalized—and the fact that we used some existing parts—the prototype car was complete only ten months after we began working on the details of the design. This prototype was to be the automaker’s first true sports car and it was scheduled to be unveiled at the Tokyo Motor Show. However, issues arose and it was postponed indefinitely, never seeing the eyes of the public.    And so, aside from those of us involved with the project, I doubt many people even knew this sports car ever existed. After less than two years, our business partnership came to an end.    <ends>    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #cars #automotive #manufacturing #engineering #history 

===What the Japanese Bayberry Trees Have Seen===   21. Business Plans    On September 10th, Managing Executive Officer Ogura held a no-nonsense meeting with a group of managers to discuss how we would make our motorcycles a viable business. The topics were financing issues, profit planning, our sales structure and more.  The reason I wrote that the meeting was “no-nonsense” was because the company’s financial situation at the time was anything but rosy. In fact, finances were so bleak that the group was forced to consider selling some of the company’s real estate assets to raise the funds needed to start motorcycle production.    At the time, the company had only sufficient assets to produce between 150 and 200 units monthly. At those low production volumes, it was all too clear that not only would the cost of each bike be unfeasibly high, but also every sale would result in a loss of tens of thousands of yen.    The decision had already been made to establish an independent company to produce motorcycles, but how long could Nippon Gakki shoulder the burden of a company constantly in the red? In the end, Nippon Gakki would indeed have to cover the losses, and that raised the next question: How long would it last? It was a conundrum that seemed everlasting.    Photo: Aerial shot of Nippon Gakki’s main factory the following year (1955)    <continues>    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #motorcycles #racing #manufacturing #engineering #history #design

The next model feature from the Communication Plaza’s previous Historical Models Demonstration Run is from nearly 60 years ago: the YDS-3C. It was a scrambler model for overseas markets based on the high-performance YDS-3 and drew attention in America's then-emerging off-road bike segment. It featured an Autolube-equipped 2-stroke, in-line 2-cylinder engine with excellent power, reliability and durability.    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #classic #historical #cars #supercar #motorcycles #racing #history #manufacturing #engineering #design 

Happy Yamaha Day! Today marks our 69th birthday!       In our fourth year of operating this official account, we've reached nearly 85,000 followers!      Thank you very much for your continued interest in Yamaha Motor, whether it is for our trademark motorcycles and outboards, our long history of innovation and design, or for any of the many other businesses, services, and activities we provide and conduct.       From President Yoshihiro Hidaka:  “2024 marks the seventh year for us to celebrate Yamaha Day, and we see Yamaha Motor distributors and subsidiaries in countries around the world putting on grander events year after year. I think we can say that July 1st has become firmly established as a special day on which we think about as well as celebrate the Yamaha brand. I remember feeling Kando myself every time I have heard the news of what the global Yamaha family is planning or putting on for Yamaha Day, so let me say a big thank you to everyone working to again make the day a special one.”      Please look forward to hearing more exciting news and developments from us here in Japan!      #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #YamahaDay2024 #motorcycles #outboards #robotics #manufacturing #engineering #history #design #anniversary #birthday 

=== Days Gone By===  Days Spent with Cars – 5. Setbacks & Comebacks      So with this and similar failures, the Yasukawa Research Lab was disbanded in February 1962 and absorbed into the company’s engine department. Thereafter, the only project on which work continued focused on creating an improved version of the Tice Engine. In the end, the two sports cars our bold dream led us to build and the improved-but-unfinished Tice Engine were all that remained—an all the more sad conclusion to what we had started.    In November of that year, the two-pronged setback of a scooter model that flopped and a contraction in the motorcycle market forced Yamaha Motor to downsize, resulting in the Yamaha Technological Research Institute also closing. With the situation dire, many felt that the company just didn’t have the leeway anymore to continue work on car-related projects. We’d done so much and worked so hard to get started in the automotive industry, and it would be such a disappointment for everything to end like this.    So, I made a personal request to President Kawakami to allow us to continue our work. The president also wanted to somehow keep our aspirations alive, so company management went through the banks to see if one of Japan’s carmakers was interested in using our technology. It was likely thanks to the talks with the banks that one carmaker sent the head of their technology arm and other executives to visit Yamaha to see the cars and engines we’d built.    Seeing what we’d built in person is what likely convinced them, and we began drawing up the contract and specifics for a business partnership. A development department to specifically serve as the point of contact for work based on the partnership was set up at Yamaha. Executive Officer Ono was general manager and I was the department manager. Much of the team was made up of former members of the Yasukawa Research Lab that had been reassigned to work with us. We had been able to save our work on automobiles and secure its future.    The first jobs we worked on included designing a V8 engine, designing a prototype convertible top, and testing to see if installing our 2,000cc DOHC YX-80 engine—the improved version of the Tice Engine—could result in new models gaining a different character. In other words, most of the work we did was early-stage development.    Photo: Yamaha Motor’s first scooter, the SC-1, was loaded with advanced technologies, but plagued by mechanical issues due to its complexity.    <ends>    #Yamaha #RevsyourHeart #cars #automotive #manufacturing #engineering #history