IDEMITSU KOSAN CO., LTD.

Japanese petrochemical corporation founded in 1911, as Idemitsu Shokai, and reorganized and incorporated under its current name in 1940. Headquarters are in Tokyo. The company as originally founded in Moji (now a part of Kita-Kyushu), Japan, by Idemitsu Sazo was a general trading company, dealing in the distribution of various goods, including such commodities as grain and such bulk products as fuel and lubricating oils. By 1914 the company had embarked on a major expansion on the Asian mainland, opening an office in Darien, Manchuria, and extending a sales network first through North China, Korea, and Taiwan and later into South China. By the outbreak of World War II in Europe, the company was making sizable inroads into the territories once the exclusive trading grounds of Dutch, British, and American companies. In 1945, however, with its overseas trade lost, Idemitsu Kosan fell on hard times. In 1949, under the Allied occupation, it secured rights to distribute petroleum products. The company first expanded into marketing and distribution, creating a fleet of tankers and establishing depots and warehouses. By 1957 the company had begun refining oil and was importing crude oil from a variety of overseas sources. By 1976 it was also producing its own oil and gas in the offshore Aga Field in the Sea of Japan. Meanwhile, in 1964, with the creation of a subsidiary, Idemitsu Petrochemical Co., Ltd., the company began producing a wide range of petrochemical products, including plastics and synthetics.