Company Goals & Objectives
Harmonic Drive®, a state-of-the-art speed reducer gear, plays an essential role in the global motion control society.
Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. and its strategically deployed group of companies are recognized as the one and only manufacturer of highly precise gears that will contribute to the motion control professionals on the planet.
High Precision: we have created the language in the motion control industry.
Business Description
Harmonic Drive Systems Inc., headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, with its factory in Azumino City, Nagano, is known for Harmonic Drive®, a unique high precision gear drive.
Harmonic Drive® gears are widely used in industrial robots, semiconductor manufacturing equipment, medical equipment, and aerospace programs, to name but a few.
Our products and services are also available from group companies in Germany and the US to serve our customers worldwide.
Background
Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. has been a public company since 1998, after the departure from our partnership with the corporation that then held the patent of the Harmonic Drive® gear invented by Mr. Walton C. Musser. Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. today is listed on the TSE JASDAQ (6324).
Industry
Harmonic Drive®
This state-of-the-art speed reducer applies the elastic dynamics of metal to make possible precise positioning. It consists of just three components but achieves a high speed-reduction ratio and can maintain highly precise positioning.
Harmonic Planetary®
This high-precision, high-rigidity planetary speed reducer is based on the same precision manufacturing technology and know-how as the Harmonic Drive®. It achieves high rotational accuracy with an original backlash-prevention mechanism.
Mechatronics
We call our products, which consist of speed reducers, motors, sensors, drivers, controllers and other systems, as “mechatronics products”. Incorporated with the features and benefits of Harmonic Drive®, they can provide the highly sophisticated motion control desired by our customers.
Competitive Advantages
Despite the long-expired original patent acquired from Mr. Musser, no one but Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. has ever developed and evolved the gear into Harmonic Drive® gears today – that can be only achieved by our painstaking work and meticulous attitude throughout the factory.
Financial Projection
Consolidated financial performance targets for fiscal year ending March 31, 2018:
Net sales: 35 billion yen
Operating income: 9.5 billion yen
Net income attributable to owners of parent: 7 billion yen
Management
Chairman And Representative Director: Mitsumasa Ito
President And Representative Director: Akira Nagai
Diretor: Hideo Yasue
Director: Akira Maruyama
Director: Yoshimasa Ito
Outside Director: Haruhiko Yoshida (Independent Director)
Outside Director: Shinji Sakai (Independent Director)
Outside Director: Masanobu Nakamura (Independent Director)
Outside Corporate Auditor: Akio Kimura
Corporate Auditor: Atsushi Kawakita
Corporate Auditor: Yoshio Yamazaki
Outside Auditor: Junji Omi
Employees
530 people (consolidated)
Website
https://www.hds.co.jp/english/
Other Notes
Media Release: Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. signs agreement with SRI International to develop novel rotary mechanical transmission for robotics and industry
Tokyo, Aug 2016 — Harmonic Drive Systems Inc. (HDSI: Tokyo, Japan) and SRI International have reached an agreement to jointly develop a novel, highly efficient rotary mechanical transmission.
Motors use mechanical transmissions to increase total system efficiency and reduce weight over direct-drive solutions. The new transmission in development will incorporate a novel “pure rolling cycloid” motion principle that will provide energy and weight savings along with low back-driving torque over existing technologies. This technology can benefit the robotics industry and also other diverse industries that use Harmonic Drive® products.
HDSI, known for its Harmonic Drive® products, is expected to capitalize its high precision manufacturing skills and technologies on production of the new transmission. The joint Harmonic Drive and SRI R&D team has already started to work on detailed designs and prototypes for the new mechanical transmission.
Said Dr Yoshihide Kiyosawa, Chief Technical Officer of Harmonic Drive Systems Inc., “Even though I personally have been engaged in research on gearing mechanisms for many years, I had never before seen a speed reduction mechanism quite like this one, based on such a novel and unique principle.
“With the guidance and cooperation of SRI, an elite team of top innovators, along with our company’s precision machining technology and skills built up in developing and manufacturing the Harmonic Drive® over the years, we look forward to achieving commercial release of this new mechanism as quickly as possible.
“I am confident that speed reducers using this new mechanism hold the promise of opening up new markets for motion and power transmission.”
“SRI has a long and storied history of robotic component innovation, including dielectric elastomer actuators and electroadhesion,” said Alexander Kernbaum, Ph.D., a principal innovator on the project from SRI. “We are proud to work with Harmonic Drive Systems to develop this next generation transmission. Their commitment to quality and precision, and their enthusiasm for market changing innovations make them an ideal collaborator.”
About SRI International
SRI International creates world-changing solutions making people safer, healthier, and more productive. SRI, a research center headquartered in Menlo Park, California, works primarily in advanced technology and systems, biosciences, computing, and education. SRI brings its innovations to the marketplace through technology licensing, spin-off ventures and new product solutions.
