The former head of Suzuki Motor, Osamu Suzuki, who turned the minicar manufacturer into a global player, dies at the age of 94

TOKYO (AP) – Osamu Suzuki, the charismatic former head of Suzuki Motor Corp. who helped transform the Japanese maker of mini-vehicles into a globally competitive company, has died, the company said Friday. He was 94 years old.

Suzuki was known for his candid remarks and kindness, calling himself “an old SME guy.” In 1978, he became Suzuki’s CEO and led the company as it became the first Japanese carmaker to begin local production in India, where its cars were hugely popular.

Born Osamu Matsuda on January 30, 1930, Suzuki worked in banking after graduating from the Faculty of Law at Chuo University in Tokyo. He joined Suzuki Motor, based in Hamamatsu, central Japan, in 1958, when he married the daughter of then-president Shunzo Suzuki, who was part of the company’s founding family. As is sometimes customary in such situations, Matsuda took his wife’s maiden name.

In 1979, a year after he became the fourth president of Suzuki Motor, he introduced an affordable minicar that became a huge hit and entered global markets.

Under Suzuki’s leadership, the company’s sales increased more than tenfold, to 3 trillion yen ($19 billion) in the 2000s. .

In the 2000s, Suzuki also established business partnerships with other world leaders such as General Motors and Volkswagen AG. In the face of intensifying competition and industrial transformation, Suzuki also formed a capital alliance with Toyota Motor Corp. in 2019. to jointly develop autonomous vehicles.

While other Japanese automakers expanded into the US and Chinese markets with a wide range of vehicles, Suzuki stuck to mini and compact cars, mainly in South and Southeast Asia.

Suzuki emphasized the importance of understanding the level of grassroots activity.

“The basis of production is to produce products of good quality and at a low price,” Suzuki once said in an interview with broadcaster NHK. “We can’t cut costs by sitting in the president’s or chairman’s office, so I have to be in the factory to understand the work and get ideas.”

Suzuki stepped down as president at the age of 85 in 2015, handing over the position to his son, Toshihiro Suzuki. He served as an advisor to the company after resigning as CEO in 2021.

The company said Suzuki died on Wednesday of malignant lymphoma.