The Shiseido Group was established in 1872 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. The company is engaged in the cosmetics and toiletries industry. The group also has massive interests in the boutique, restaurant, salon, fine chemicals, pharmaceutical and beauty foods sectors. Shiseido is the largest manufacturer of cosmetics in Japan with more than 20 brands. The firms product offering consists of 3 product lines and these are the Skincare range, the Pureness range and the Beneficence range (Shiseido, 2005 Jones, Kanno Egawa, 2005).
The Shiseido Group is a conglomerate consisting of about 100 subsidiaries. Thirty seven of these subsidiaries are local operations, 3 are affiliated firms and the rest (60) are overseas companies. The overseas operations include about 70 business sites in 70 countries, 10 manufacturing sites and 6 research and development (R D) sites. The overseas manufacturing bases are located in the US, China, France, Taiwan, and New Zealand while the RD bases are in China, the US and France. Currently, the company is headed by Shinno Maseda who is the President, CEO, and Director. Other senior leaders are Yasuhiko Harada who is the Corporate Senior Executive Officer and Director and Kozo Hanada who is the Chief Officer Professional Business Operations Division (Yahoo Finance, 2009).
The mission of Shiseido is to identify new, richer sources of value and use them to create beauty in the lives and culture of those we serve (Shiseido, 2005 p.5). During the first half Fiscal Year which Ended in October, the company recorded an 11 decline in its profits. The revenue for the first quarter announced in March, 2009 stood at US 7095.10 million and this represented a 2.6 decline in revenue compared to the previous year. Over the same period, the firm witnessed a marginal rise in the number of its employees as they increased by 0.1 and currently stand at 28,810 (Yahoo Finance, 2009).
Overview of the Global Cosmetics Industry