Taking a look around at Tamron’s Foshan plant and listening to various explanations and episodes, there was one thing that really surprised me. I was told that most of the dozens of Chinese managers overseeing the plant’s production lines can communicate in Japanese. I feel that this is testament to the fact that the people at Tamron’s plant in China are clearly making a great deal of effort.
   Being able to converse directly with the Tamron employees in Japanese brings a number of benefits.
   For example, these Chinese managers can share information with the designers at the plants in Aomori and the Head Office in Japan during video conference meetings, without having to go through interpreters. Even for a seemingly small problem, instead of leaving it untouched, people can rapidly move toward resolving it by maintaining close communication.

   There is also less need for Japanese engineers to visit the Tamron plant in Foshan. Maybe at the time of the launch of a new product, five or six Japanese personnel will visit on a short business trip, but they will soon return home once mass production is on track. This is exactly the same relationship as the one between the plant in Aomori and the Head Office, meaning that there is no “special treatment” just because this is a plant in China instead of in Japan.
   Maybe two or three Japanese personnel at the most are here on longer business trips to oversee the plant’s manufacturing lines in the current conditions. Most of the workers at the Tamron plant in Foshan are local Chinese, which appears to be one sign of how self-reliant the Foshan plant has become in terms of its operations.

   In blog No.7 of this series, I gave a brief overview of Tamron’s Foshan plant, and I mentioned that the number of employees working at the plant is around 3,000 people, with a relatively young average age of 26.3 years. In terms of the gender ratio, roughly 70% of the employees are now female workers, with male workers making up the remaining 30%.
   So, what kinds of people work at the Tamron plant in Foshan right now, producing Tamron’s interchangeable lenses? I felt that not only I but also you would probably be interested, so I will now introduce some of these people.

   It is simply not possible to introduce a lot of these employees, though, so with seven or eight people selected as their representatives, I asked for their photos at the relevant workplaces and interviewed them briefly.
   So, here goes.
 

Now 31 years of age, she is a veteran employee, having worked here for 14 years. Ms. Wu is responsible for the settings and adjustments for the grinding and polishing machines, most of which she is well versed in, I understand. She is also responsible for quality control for the ground and polished products. Visible behind her are the machines used in the polishing process, the final operation in lens grinding and polishing. A beautiful, transparent state is achieved here for each glass lens element.
 

A new team member who joined the company six months ago. She is a young worker of just 19 years of age, and I understand that she is very hardworking and eager to learn, so I look forward to her future career. Ms. Yan is from Shaoguan City in the north of Guangdong Province. Seen behind her are the machines for the fine grinding (smoothing) process. The glass materials delivered to a plant first undergo coarse (rough) grinding, followed by fine grinding (smoothing), and they are then turned into photographic lens elements after proceeding through the polishing processes.
 

Having worked here for 11 years, he is a veteran employee who is now 35 years of age. Centering is a very important process for each lens element, with its circumference ground in order to accurately position the optical axis in the center. He handles the pre-coating lens elements, for which special care and attention are needed, and the lens elements after coating. Mr. Huang is the Team Leader for the centering process, and is responsible for engineering management for the centering equipment and for adjustments to its control software programs. Visible behind him is the centering equipment.
 

Having worked for eight years at the plant, he is now 31 years of age. Mr. Liang is the Field Manager for the metal machining processes using the NC lathe.
After graduating from a technical school, he undertook work related to NC lathe operations at another company for around two years, after which he joined the Tamron plant in Foshan. As Team Leader, he provides guidance to the younger workers.

He is 28 years of age, and has worked here for six years. After graduating from a junior college specializing in mechanical engineering, he joined the Tamron plant in Foshan as a metal engineer. Mr. Ou is the Team Manager for the NC machining processes, and has the ultimate responsibility for setting the machinery at the time of the launch of new models.
 

A veteran employee who has worked at the plant for 18 years. Now 40 years of age, he has been an employee from around the time when the Tamron plant in Foshan commenced its operations. He is currently in a managerial position as Deputy Manager. Metal molds are set into the injection molding machines seen behind him, and the machines produce precision lens barrels using resin pellets as the raw material. Mr. Liu is passionate about excellent product quality, and I understand that he makes every effort to produce plastic components with a precision of within 0.003 mm. “I have been able to learn many technologies and skills thanks to my superiors and colleagues at the company. I am very grateful to them,” he said.
 

He is 40 years of age, and has been with the company for 13 years. He is a veteran worker in charge of the coating processes, and is now the Team Manager. Mr. Huang is mainly responsible for engineering management, and also has the skills to operate the special coating equipment himself. He is standing besides a dome plate nicknamed the “umbrella,” on which the lens elements are laid out. Each “umbrella” filled with lens elements is placed into a coating chamber as seen behind him, and with a vacuum state created inside the chamber, the coating materials are deposited on to the surfaces of the lens element in an ultrathin layer.
 

She is 23 years of age, and has been working at the plant for six years. A person of action, she now serves as a Team Leader, although she is still young. Ms. Kong is holding an SP AF17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical [IF] (Model B005) in her hands, and behind her is the assembly line for the SP AF17-50mm (Model B005). Being assigned as the Team Leader for an assembly line means that she can supervise the operations for the other lenses and has the skills to assemble a lens all by herself.

 

Ms. Xie is 23 years old and has been working for six years. She is gentle and has earned a reputation for taking a sincere initiative in responding to instructions that she receives. She is currently engaged in the VC operation inspection of SPAF17 - 50mmF/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Asphericral [IF](B005). The VC unit is carefully inspected as a part in the assembly processes, and, after it is embedded in lenses, repeated inspections are conducted to check that it satisfies the predetermined conditions after it is actually set in the camera body.
 

Introducing plant employees: “Extra edition”
On the right is

Mr. Zhang is 56 years old and is a Director in charge of the Overseas Production Division and also chairman of the Foshan plant in China. Since he joined Tamron as a mid-career worker after completing a master’s course at Daito Bunka University, he has been in charge of operations at plants in China for 19 years. He was assigned to his current position after working on the establishment of Tamron’s Foshan plant. He is from Shanghai and is now living by himself, leaving his family behind. He speaks Japanese quickly and well, with a Shanghai accent.

On the left is

Mr. Zhang is 50 years old. He graduated from the Yatsushiro National College of Technology and the Nagaoka University of Technology and joined Tamron in 1993. He has been working for Tamron for 23 years. He initially worked as an engineer in designing mechanisms at the Omiya Head Office, and was seconded to Foshan when the construction of the plant in China was completed. He is from Beijing and now lives in Foshan with his family. His Chinese title, Kunji, is equivalent to that of “Director” in Japan. Kunjicho means Chairman of the Board of Directors and Sokeiri is equivalent to a General Manager.