Media Coverage
“The president of our company Fukuda`s interview” article was published in The Daily Engineering & Construction News
2015/01/30“The president of our company Fukuda`s interview” article was published in The Daily Engineering & Construction News January 30 issue.
Co-Sourcing for Ideal Facility Establishment
Nikkan Kensetsu Kogyo Shimbun
(The Daily Engineering & Construction News)
January 30, 2015
Tetsuya Fukuda, President & CEO
Fukuda & Partners
subtitle (middle)
We have a team of varying backgrounds and expertise to provide our services.
article
Fukuda & Partners (Tokyo) provides a new style of specialized services in construction and real estate. It is increasing its industry presence with its “co-sourcing” business model, focused on construction of logistics and retail facilities. The company was founded in 2001 by its President Tetsuya Fukuda. Fukuda had worked for a major general contractor, where he had established a logistics & production engineering division and had grown it to a 10-billion-yen business as its marketing head. He utilized this experience to start his own business focused on logistics and retail facilities.
“Our company offers comprehensive services tailored to our customers’ needs, from site-searching, project planning, market research and architectural design to construction supervision, leasing and operation administration. The uniqueness of our company is that it provides co-sourcing, where we collaborate with our customers to find the best solutions in construction planning and real estate utilization, as opposed to the typical outsourcing. Many of our customers do not have facility construction as their main business, and therefore lack a dedicated organization for real estate and construction. We provide that function, and manage the business on their behalf in a neutral and objective way.”
99% of its business is done by sole-source contracts, and the total land area covered by its logistic facility development management and project management has come to 4800 square kilometers.
The company’s workforce is made up of people of varying backgrounds and talent. There are veterans with years of experience in the construction business, as well as people with backgrounds in finance, communication technology, and manufacturing, all contributing to the company with their respective expertise. All full-time employees, regardless of the age at employment, are given opportunities for salary raises and promotions up to the retirement age of 65. Some employees joining at 55 have become executives at 60. An employee joining at 60 has become a general manager at 64. It offers flexible forms of employment and work hours, allowing more female employees to become major contributors.
“Expertise is in the people, not in the structure. The people are the company’s assets”, declares President Fukuda.
The construction industry is currently robust with reconstruction from the East Japan disaster as well as investment for the Tokyo Olympics in 2020. But the general analysis is that the current construction demand is short-term.
“Certainly oversupply, as well as increases in property prices and construction costs, may dampen investments. But as for logistics and retail facilities that we specialize in, investments will continue because of the needs for BCP (business continuity planning) against future disasters, as well as refurbishing of dated facilities, including the accompanying temporary relocations. The construction industry in Japan may shrink, but our company’s target has never been just to expand business volume, but more to make true contributions to society by maintaining employment and living up to the customers’ expectations for quality of service. This has led to our 13 consecutive years of profitability. Going forward, in addition to our co-sourcing and real estate conversion businesses, we will develop an on-line business, data-basing our specialized services and offering them to more customers at reasonable prices.”
The company is also expediting its expansion overseas. Subsidiaries were established in Singapore and Myanmar last year. In Myanmar it already has a consignment for designing and construction of a service apartment for Japanese corporate expatriates. “Our immediate business in Myanmar will mostly be construction of needed offices and residences, but we will be prepared to offer the same services there that we offer in Japan, when the infrastructure has been laid out and Japanese logistics companies and trading companies enter the market. We will also be expanding to Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand. With Singapore as our regional hub, our target is to be generating 20% of our revenue from our business in Southeast Asia 10 years from now.”