Takeo Fujisawa (Photo via Pinterest)
Auto and Tech | via JCN Newswire | Takeo Fujisawa, Honda Motor Co-founder, to be Inducted into Automotive Hall of Fame | Fujisawa will join Honda founder Soichiro Honda in the Automotive Hall of Fame. | Detroit, Michigan, Feb 13, 2023 – The Automotive Hall of Fame will induct Honda Motor Co., Ltd. co-founder Takeo Fujisawa at its July 20 awards ceremony at The Fillmore Detroit. Fujisawa will join Soichiro Honda, the first Japanese automotive executive elected into the Automotive Hall of Fame in Dearborn, Michigan, in 1989.
Fujisawa, born on November 10, 1910, worked as a salesperson for a steel products firm and subsequently a lumber company when he met Soichiro Honda in August 1949, one year after Honda Motor Co. was founded in Hamamatsu, Japan. It followed Honda’s first full-fledged motorcycle, the Dream D-Type. Honda and Fujisawa immediately connected and talked about their company strategies and goals, despite their differences.
Fujisawa joined Honda Motor in October 1949 after quickly building confidence and a shared vision for the company. Honda, the company’s president, designed and developed several unique cars, including the Super Cub, the world’s best-selling mobility product. Fujisawa was his right hand, managing sales, finance, and marketing.
Fujisawa’s marketing expertise, commercial understanding, and ability to plan distinct growth pathways complemented Soichiro Honda’s engineering skills and mobility vision. Honda and Fujisawa retired in March 1973 after 25 years. Fujisawa had a major impact on Honda’s global and U.S. operations from the start.
Fujisawa made several lasting and impactful business decisions that are still relevant today:
Starting Honda Business in the U.S.
In 1959, and by then the senior managing director of Honda, Fujisawa made the challenging decision to establish American Honda as Honda’s first subsidiary outside Japan. At the time, the entire U.S. motorcycle industry sold no more than 60,000 units annually — mostly larger bikes. One member of the team recommended expansion in Asia, where small motorcycles from Europe, like those made by Honda, were already in use. He suggested that America, the “land of the automobile,” was too difficult a target for Honda. Fujisawa had another idea. “On second thought, let’s do America,” he said. “To succeed in the U.S. is to succeed worldwide. To take up the challenge of the American market may be the most difficult thing to do, but it’s a critical step in expanding the export of our products.” Without Fujisawa’s leadership, Honda would not be the success story in the United States that it is today.
Creating Independent U.S. Dealer Network
Fujisawa adopted many innovative sales and marketing strategies in Japan and the U.S. This included the decision to start motorcycle sales by establishing Honda’s own dealer network. Despite suggestions that Honda should follow the approach of other Japanese companies and rely on a trading company to launch U.S. sales, Honda forged relationships with many smaller dealers, even those with no history in the motorcycle industry, and successfully expanded business from the West Coast across America. By the mid-1960s, Honda was the best-selling motorcycle brand in America.
Establishing Separate R&D Company
In 1960, based on Fujisawa’s initiative, Honda R&D Co., Ltd. was created as a separate company. Fujisawa conceived the idea with two objectives: to give Honda engineers the freedom to create new value without being constrained by the ups and downs of daily business and to protect Honda’s ability to sustain this innovation in the future when they could no longer rely on the genius of Soichiro Honda. The new R&D company ushered in an era of incredible technological and product innovation, and entering new business areas including the automobile and aviation industries. Honda R&D’s focus on research and creating new value in mobility continues to this day.
More information about Takeo Fujisawa will be provided at the time of his formal induction into the Automotive Hall of Fame in July 2023.
