Okamura: Oceans of Opportunity

By Daniel de Bomford, Sean McBride and Sasha Lauture

 Safe tap water is often something taken for granted, with little thought to the marvelous technologies that work behind the scenes. The systems that underpin our drinking water are often energy, resource intensive and require a high level of expertise to maintain. Okamura Corporation, an engineering and construction company, has pushed industrial boundaries for 90 years, leveraging its flexibility as an SME. With the present depreciated Yen, company President Kazuyuki Okamura believes there are an abundance of opportunities for the firm in previously inaccessible markets. “We believe we can now compete with our high quality and higher cost with an acceptable range of pricing and increased cost competitiveness due to the depreciating yen,” he says.

With its swift Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) cycle, Okamura can take the needs of customers and the market and quickly adapt, evolve and optimize its service. For water treatment, it is the only supplier who provides chlorine gas treatment in Japan and has been successful in leveraging this service internationally. Mr. Okamura explains, “The reason we continue with this business in Japan is because our customers have full turnkey opportunities outside Japan, from design and procurement to building and operation.”

Chlorinator

Okamura’s comprehensive engineering services are flexible and tailor-made to suit their clients. “We base our design on the requirements of the customer, optimizing our design without deviation from specifications to the extent possible,” Mr. Okamura says.

Looking to continue its expansion into international markets, Okamura has two focuses. Servicing the G7 green transformation and expanding into Asia for supply chain enhancement and dispersion of risk. It already has a 70% share of water purifiers in Bangkok and looks to expand further into the region. As Mr. Okamura says, “I would like Okamura to become the core supplier of safe tap water in Asian countries.”