The chairman and three others have stepped down after accounting discrepancies discovered.
The new York Times reported that Tadahito Yamamoto, the Chairman; Haruhiko Yoshida, a Deputy President; and two Directors, Katsuhiko Yanagawa and Jun Takagi stepped down yesterday after further investigations into the accounting revealed that the losses were bigger than initially thought.
Kenji Sukeno, President and Chief Operating Officer of Fujifilm Holdings apologised yesterday at a news conference. Fujifilm Holdings owns 75 percent of Fuji Xerox and Sukeno said: “We will strengthen corporate governance at Fuji Xerox.”
An investigation has been ongoing into the way Fuji Xerox sales managers “reported income from photocopier leases” in New Zealand and Australia and found that revenue had been overestimated by 37.5 billion Yen ($340/€303 million) over the last five years.
Managers were in denial that the business was struggling and so they inflated the figures to meet their targets but a whistleblower identified the problems at the New Zealand plant during 2015 and reported it. Problems have also been discovered in Australia’s accountancy at the Fuji Xerox plant.
The four executives affected will leave their positions 22 June and replacements for them will be announced at the annual shareholders meeting but Shigetaka Komori, Chairman and Chief Executive of Fujifilm Holdings plans to take on the role of Chairman at Fuji Xerox as well.