Zexel
Encyclopedia
Zexel is a Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese auto-components manufacturer. It was founded in 1939 as Diesel Kiki Co., Ltd., under a Bosch
Robert Bosch GmbH
Robert Bosch GmbH is a multinational engineering and electronics company headquartered in Gerlingen, near Stuttgart, Germany. It is the world's largest supplier of automotive components...

 license, for domestic production of fuel-injection pumps for diesel engine
Diesel engine
A diesel engine is an internal combustion engine that uses the heat of compression to initiate ignition to burn the fuel, which is injected into the combustion chamber...

s. Originally established with an investment from Isuzu Motors
Isuzu
, is a Japanese car, commercial vehicle and heavy truck manufacturing company, headquartered in Tokyo. In 2005, Isuzu became the world's largest manufacturer of medium to heavy duty trucks. It has assembly and manufacturing plants in the Japanese city of Fujisawa, as well as in the prefectures...

 Ltd., (a major Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese manufacturer of engines for heavy-duty vehicles), this company was renamed ZEXEL Corp. in 1990.

The company was reorganized as Bosch Automotive Systems Corp. in 2000 after Robert Bosch GmbH
Robert Bosch GmbH
Robert Bosch GmbH is a multinational engineering and electronics company headquartered in Gerlingen, near Stuttgart, Germany. It is the world's largest supplier of automotive components...

 of Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 bought majority shares in Zexel Corporation. Zexel is now a Bosch brand
Brand
The American Marketing Association defines a brand as a "Name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller's good or service as distinct from those of other sellers."...

 name.

Research and development

Since its inception as Diesel Kiki Ltd., the company developed many products that helped start the revolution of Japanese automotive excellence. Because of its big research and development
Research and development
The phrase research and development , according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, refers to "creative work undertaken on a systematic basis in order to increase the stock of knowledge, including knowledge of man, culture and society, and the use of this stock of...

 capacity, it also participated in international fora on environmental protection
Environmental movement
The environmental movement, a term that includes the conservation and green politics, is a diverse scientific, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues....

 projects like the reduction of ozone depleting
Ozone depletion
Ozone depletion describes two distinct but related phenomena observed since the late 1970s: a steady decline of about 4% per decade in the total volume of ozone in Earth's stratosphere , and a much larger springtime decrease in stratospheric ozone over Earth's polar regions. The latter phenomenon...

 substances, smoke
Smoke
Smoke is a collection of airborne solid and liquid particulates and gases emitted when a material undergoes combustion or pyrolysis, together with the quantity of air that is entrained or otherwise mixed into the mass. It is commonly an unwanted by-product of fires , but may also be used for pest...

 emission, etc.

Ownership changes

Following the Bosch takeover, there was a series of ownership changes that resulted in the division of the major business groups: fuel injection pumps, automotive airconditioners
Air conditioning
An air conditioner is a home appliance, system, or mechanism designed to dehumidify and extract heat from an area. The cooling is done using a simple refrigeration cycle...

, bus
Bus
A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...

 airconditioners and mobile refrigeration units
Vapor-compression refrigeration
Vapor-compression refrigeration is one of the many refrigeration cycles available for use. It has been and is the most widely used method for air-conditioning of large public buildings, offices, private residences, hotels, hospitals, theaters, restaurants and automobiles...

, and the differential and airbag
Airbag
An Airbag is a vehicle safety device. It is an occupant restraint consisting of a flexible envelope designed to inflate rapidly during an automobile collision, to prevent occupants from striking interior objects such as the steering wheel or a window...

 product lines. For example, M.C. Bernardo Inc. (the exclusive representative of Diesel Kiki/Zexel in the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

) had to turn over business to Robert Bosch Philippines, like other Zexel partners in other countries and regions.

Automotive airconditioners

Valeo
Valeo
Valeo is a French automotive components manufacturer.-History:The Société Anonyme Française du Ferodo was founded in 1923 in Saint-Ouen, a suburb of Paris...

 of France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 bought the automotive airconditioner business, and refocused manufacturing to support the European market. The shift in focus was the reason why Zexel Automotive Climate Control
HVAC
HVAC refers to technology of indoor or automotive environmental comfort. HVAC system design is a major subdiscipline of mechanical engineering, based on the principles of thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, and heat transfer...

 Systems (ZACCS) stopped its operations providing products, unit prototyping and after-market services to Isuzu, Nissan, Nissan Diesel
UD Trucks
UD Trucks Corporation is a Japanese company whose principal business is the manufacture and sales of light, medium and heavy duty diesel trucks, buses, bus chassis and special-purpose vehicles. The company is owned 100% by the Volvo Group since 2007. Formerly known as Nissan Diesel, the company...

 and Columbian Motors (Kia
Kia Motors
Kia Motors , headquartered in Seoul, is South Korea's second-largest automobile manufacturer, following the Hyundai Motor Company, with sales of over 1.4 million vehicles in 2010...

 assembler)in the Philippines.

Bus airconditioners and refrigeration

Thermo King
Thermo King Corporation
Thermo King Corporation, based in Bloomington, Minnesota and a unit of Ingersoll Rand Company Limited, is a manufacturer of transport temperature control systems for trucks, trailers, shipboard containers and railway cars as well as HVAC systems for bus, shuttle and passenger rail applications...

 bought into the bus airconditioner and refrigeration lines.

Differentials

The Torsen differential was purchased by Toyoda Machine Works Ltd. which eventually merged with another company to form JTEKT Torsen North America.

External links

  • http://ozone.unep.org/teap/Reports/TEAP_Reports/TEAP_2007_Legacy_Report.pdf
  • http://ozone.unep.org/teap/Reports/TEAP_Reports/
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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