Interesting Seiko News...

Koichi Murano Dismissed for “Dogmatic” Management


Founding family member Shinji Hattori is new president. Seiko said Koichi Murano, 72, was removed from his post on Friday and replaced by Shinji Hattori, a 57-year old executive vice president and the only director related to the family that established the watchmaker in 1881.

Seiko said the board voted three to two to dismiss Murano after a motion to remove him was put forth by Akio Harada, a former prosecutor
and the company's sole external director.

Thats cause he was the guy behind hardlex vs sapphire on the higher end models

This is a VERY unusual move in Japanese Business. Moreso because the outside member of the Board proposed it. This sort of thing is just not done in their country. Hopefully this will lead to some changes but the main reason was the unthoughtful manner in which the old CEO was mechanically running their retail outlets apparently.

Wow ! THIS sounds like BIG news !!! Will have to keep
an eye on things, to see what changes might be coming
in the future for them !..Thanks for the info !

He probably got a golden parachute to soften the fall. The CEO of the company I work for was basically shown the door by two outside board members appointed by a venture capital group that bought a twenty some percent interest in the company. Between the severance and stock options he won't be missing any meals. In a way its often good to get board members from the outside to shake up the old boys club a little bit.

merichar wrote:

He probably got a golden parachute to soften the fall. The CEO of the company I work for was basically shown the door by two outside board members appointed by a venture capital group that bought a twenty some percent interest in the company. Between the severance and stock options he won't be missing any meals. In a way its often good to get board members from the outside to shake up the old boys club a little bit.

Very true! But this sort of thing is all but unheard of in Japanese businesses.

Often these kind of political moves are either personal or have something to do with what happens outside the office.

Perhaps he broke some social taboo or is not carrying the banner as he should when at the okiya!

It might have something to do with whats happening in the north american market.I noticed while at the mall
that two jewelery store chains didn't have Seiko.I asked about it since only citizen,movado/esq was visible.Both stores said Seiko
pulled inventory from the stores and didn't renew they're contracts.I figured it had something to do
with the new seiko outlets and the introduction of the Ananta line and other higher end Seikos to this market.
Most of the chains that carry Seiko aren't setup to sell watches that are over 1k.

yamahaki wrote:

It might have something to do with whats happening in the north american market.I noticed while at the mall
that two jewelery store chains didn't have Seiko.I asked about it since only citizen,movado/esq was visible.Both stores said Seiko
pulled inventory from the stores and didn't renew they're contracts.I figured it had something to do
with the new seiko outlets and the introduction of the Ananta line and other higher end Seikos to this market.
Most of the chains that carry Seiko aren't setup to sell watches that are over 1k.

Nothing about the NA market was mentioned in any of the sources I could find but retail practices in Japan were mentioned specifically. Basically, from what I can gather being Gaijin (外人), he left the retail portion on autopilot and let one Board member direct his actions in that realm without exercising his own authority as CEO. That segment has flagged and the 3 Board members felt that his leadership role had been abandoned by him in that area.