Message from the President

Sustainability is about demonstrating our purpose within society. We have worked to address, from both risk and opportunity standpoints, the particularly important issues we can impact, and reflected them in our materiality.

We have identified seven material issues and classified them into three domains: the value we create in society through our business, the foundation necessary to create that value, and the overall foundation a company should have.

When envisioning a society of sustainable mobility five to ten years from now, we would like to see ourselves continuing to create value that brings joy through our unique products and services. It is no longer an exaggeration to say that electric vehicles (EV) are the key to sustainable mobility. And as the growth of the EV market picks up speed, it is anticipated that it will also diversify

We will utilize our strengths in this growing and diversifying EV market, taking on the challenge of sustainability with our own unique strategy of providing “the enjoyment of driving” and anticipating user preferences to provide satisfaction.

Our commitments to human capital development and technological innovation indeed also form an invaluable and important foundation that supports value creation, and we will further work to strengthen both.

We will also improve our risk management in order to protect the foundation of our business and the unique value that we create in society.

Regarding the decarbonization of our corporate activities specifically, we have set a target to reduce emissions by 46% compared to 2019 levels by 2030, with the ultimate hope of going carbon neutral by 2050. We will also expand our use of renewable energy, save energy through equipment updates and new manufacturing systems development, and innovate on-site decarbonization through digital transformation.

Then there are the issues of resource recycling and human rights within the supply chain, the importance of which will only increase in the future. We are already addressing both of these matters through approaches such as researching and developing sustainable materials, promoting retreading of truck and bus tires, partnering with primary natural rubber suppliers, and implementing objective risk assessment systems.

To ensure steady implementation, activity progress is compared against medium- and long-term targets and plans, changes are regularly shared with and evaluated by the Sustainability Committee, and then feedback is given to each usiness function. While progress was generally positive in the evaluation from fiscal 2021 to the present, we recognize the necessity of keeping close watch over the impact major global changes may have in the future.