In February 1998, the Mechanical Engineering Laboratory was reviewed by an external panel as part of an overall evaluation of our role and mission. The panel was made up of university professors and company directors, but also included a journalist and a member from overseas. The scope of the review included the role of MEL, our management systems, our research activities and vision for the future, and the benefit of our activities to larger society.
The panel concluded that MEL was attempting research in too wide a range of themes, and recommended that we concentrate our manpower and budget in fewer, more focused, areas which have greater potential and relevance to the needs of society. It also recommended that each active research area is subject to five-yearly review by specialists in the field, and that we should make greater efforts to disseminate the results of our research to industry, establish closer relations with industry and the universities, and promote more active research collaborations with the private sector, the universities, and academic societies. Accordingly, the laboratory now has a plan of action to implement the recommendations of the panel, has put in place processes for change, and is actively working toward improving overall performance.
It is well known that there will be large-scale reorganization of Japanese Government in the new millennium. As part of this, some national research institutes will become independent agencies. Discussions and examination of the procedures and consequences of this change have taken place in 1998, and we expect to hear landmark decisions in 1999.
In 1998, we also held several international workshops as follows:
(1) Workshop on Precision Forging to Manufacture Near Net Shape Parts (Tsukuba, September 30th 1998)
(2) International Workshop on Environmental Economic Issues in Metal Processing (Nara, November 25th 27th, 1998)
(3) First International Workshop on Microfactories (Tsukuba, December 7th-9th, 1998)
The first of these workshops was held to present the results of research done with Indian Institutes under the auspices of the Institute for Transfer of Industrial Technology. The other workshops in the series were supported by the Science and Technology Agency. You will find details of the First International Workshop on Microfactories in later pages of this report. We intend to organize several similar international workshops in 1999.
I hope that you find this report of interest and value. I sincerely hope and feel confident that it and our international workshops will aid international scientific cooperation and enable us to contribute to the economic and social development of the world.
Yoshinori Nakazawa, Dr. Eng.
Director General
Mechanical Engineering Laboratory
