Oki Electric Industry

Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd. is a Japanese IT and telecommunication company, with its headquarters based in Toranomon, Minato-ku, Tokyo. The company was founded in January 1881, and since then, it has been working towards innovation and excellence. Oki is credited for developing the first Japanese telephone, introduced in 1881. Though the company started from manufacturing telephones and its equipment, today it is also known for manufacturing information products like ATMs, printers, fax machines, etc. Oki has also tried its luck in the semiconductor business but sold the business to Rohm.

About the Oki Electric Industry

Oki is a 140 years old company founded by Kibataro Oki, a Japanese engineer. The company started in Japan, but today it is operational in more than 120 countries. Oki is into manufacturing telephones, its equipment, info-telecom systems, social infrastructure systems, ATMs, printers, multifunction devices, technology solutions, etc.
In the late 90s, the company also started to provide network services. Oki is also into sponsorships, and till now, it has sponsored English Premier League football club Portsmouth F.C., NRL team St. George Illawarra Dragons, 1.FC Kaiserslautern, and the French Ligue 1 team HSC Montpellier, etc.

The Back Story of the company

Oki Electric is the result of the discovery of the telephone by Graham Bell. Kibataro Oki, who was an engineer by profession, founded Oki as Meikōsha in 1881. He worked at a Kobusho (Ministry of Industry) factory in Japan, which started to use reverse engineering to learn the technology behind Graham Bell’s telephone. Oki was one of the team members and was inspired to make telephones common for people. In January 1881, he built the prototype of the telephone under his company Meikōsha.
Along with the prototype, he also made a silver-award-winning lacquer-coated wire which he showcased at the International Inventions Exhibition in London in 1885. The company was quite focused on making telephones common in Japan and contributed to the Telephone Expansion program running in the country. It also became a great help in the establishment of automatic exchanges.
World War I brought a rise in the demand for telephone, especially the PBX (Private Branch Exchange), resulting in rapid growth for the company. During the same time, the company was also producing railroad-type printers, portable telephones, and electric wires for its new customers overseas. In the late 30s, due to the high demand, Oki established multiple manufacturing plants in the country. WWII also brought a lot of business to the company. Oki Electric Co., Ltd. went public on Tokyo Stock Exchange in 1951. This was the same time when Oki also started the mass production of “Type-4 telephone”, a symbol of Japan getting on its feet again after the WWII destruction.
In 1956, Oki became the first company to produce the 100-line Ericsson-type crossbar-switching systems for the general public. The 60s and the 70s were the time when Oki started to try its hands in other technologies like electronics, manufacturing products like teletypewriters, perforation typewriters, electric typewriters, general-purpose computers, electro-printers, dot printers as well as terminals for online deposits. This was the same time when the company expanded to other countries and contents too. It established offices and manufacturing plants in Asian, Middle East, Central, and South American countries.
Oki also established a subsidiary for its printer manufacturing business in Philadelphia, the Oki Data Corporation, in 1972. In 1975, the company partnered with Bell Labs and built the first automatic telephone system. It also worked on wireless technology with Bell Labs. In 1982, Oki introduced the first cash-recycling ATM in the world. During the 90s, Oki also started to offer network services, and in 2004, the company released its IP CONVERGENCE Server SS9100. The server was the first Microsoft. The net-compliant server of the industry.
Today, Oki is one of the leading IT and telecommunication companies. From telephone equipment to PC peripheral to network services, the company knows the way to success. Oki has its multiple offices established in various parts of the world, and over 20,000 people are working for it. Oki Data Corporation, Oki Data Americas, and Oki Electric are some of its subsidiaries.

The Founder: Oki Kibatarō

Oki Kibatarō is the founder of Oki Electric Industry. He was born and brought up in Japan and completed his education at Tokyo Imperial University. Before founding Oki he worked at the Japanese Ministry of Industry as an engineer and was a member of the team that was trying to learn about the first telephone developed by Graham Bell in 1877. Just after one year of the discovery of the telephone, he had started to work on developing a similar product through reverse engineering, which he successfully released in 1881.