Japanese Earthquake Takes a Toll on Panasonic's Business

Everyone's talking these days about the huge disaster that hit Japan last Friday, the very powerful earthquake followed by a strong tsunami wave seriously affecting the northeastern part of Japan and, consequently, all of the companies who had plants established in the respective region.

And that's also the case with Panasonic, who's decided to release an official statement on the state of their factories in the area, just in order to keep investors in-tune, probably.

So, as the company officially informs us, their factories located in the area worst hit by the earthquake and tsunami are the AVC Networks Company Fukushima Factory (manufacturing digital cameras), AVC Networks Company Sendai Factory (manufacturing optical pickups), Panasonic Electric Works Co., Ltd. Koriyama Factory (manufacturing electronic materials) and the SANYO Electric Co., Ltd. Gunma Factory (manufacturing washer/dryers etc).

A couple of small incidents occurred in all of these facilities, with personnel incurring some minor injuries following the 9-degree Richter scale tremor from Friday, and the company's decided to halt operations in all of these locations, until a full report on the extent of the incurred damage will be drawn-up.

However, preliminary reports seem to indicate that no building collapses or fires have been recorded in the case of Panasonic's plants, which means that damages might not even be that extensive, all things considered.

As expected, Panasonic has refrained from providing any estimates as to effects the earthquake will have on its 2011 business year, but we're afraid that, much in the same way as the rest of Japanese economy, Panasonic will also suffer some losses following this disaster.

Of course, all we can hope right now is that said losses won't be that extensive and, more importantly, will be only of the material type, without involving any of the company's personnel (because, after all, there's been enough loss of life already following this huge catastrophe).