Most of us do it every day. Punch a button, wait, enter a box, punch another button, and voila, we’ve moved 10 stories.
We don’t often think about the elevator that surrounds us. It’s just a box that gets us from Point A to Point B.
But at Mitsubishi Electric, it’s all about that moving box.
And the engineers at the company have found a way to make an elevator move 4,000 feet in just one minute.
Gulp.
In addition to speed, the company has created a customized ride in which passengers punch in their destination before they even get in an elevator, leading to fewer stops and faster service.
The name Mitsubishi, familiar to many because of its cars, is a large conglomerate of autonomous companies. Mitsubishi Electric, with its U.S. headquarters in Cypress, makes parts for just about everything. Think cars, digital screens at sporting arenas, solar panels, elevators, escalators, HVAC systems and printers.
President and Chief Executive Masaki Sakuyama thinks the future is green, so he’s steering the company toward environmentally friendly products like solar panels and HVAC systems.
He thinks the election of Donald Trump could offer some immediate benefits, but the president-elect’s campaign threats to renegotiate trade agreements such as NAFTA could hurt the company.
Mitsubishi Electric, founded in 1921, has grown to 500 employees in Orange County and 5,000 across the U.S.
The Register sat down with Sakuyama, President and Chief Executive of Mitsubishi Electric US Kent Hora and Mike Corbo, general manager and executive vice president of the elevator and escalator division, to discuss the company’s recent projects and its desire to be known as a green company. Their answers have been edited for length and clarity.
Q. Mitsubishi Electric has a large line of products. What would you say is the strongest product for Mitsubishi Electric in the United States?
A. Sakuyama: Elevators/escalators and HVAC – air conditioners – and also the automotive equipment; electric equipment is a big business in the United States. We have two factories near Cincinnati. (Mitsubishi Electric’s automotive equipment includes entertainment systems and other components under the hood of a car.)
Q. How will the election of Donald Trump affect the business?
A. Sakuyama: I think there will be two phases. The first phase will be positive for business. He has promised to offer tax deductions and increase investment for social infrastructure. It will activate the economy.
The second phase is a negative one, which is protection of trading. If he really exits NAFTA, we have manufacturing capability in Mexico from which we import our products to the United States; and if the United States does exit NAFTA, and adds a 30 percent tax to products coming from Mexico, we will have to consider the negative sides.
Q. Are there any structural changes you are trying to make at the company?
A. Sakuyama: We have a very wide range of products. We’re trying to do more cross-selling … an important step to not only combine but connect and communicate between the products.
Q. What have been some of the company’s biggest accomplishments, both in the U.S. and abroad?
A. Sakuyama: In the United States, Cornell Tech Dormitory is under construction at Roosevelt Island (in New York). Energy consumption of the building is expected to be 30 percent or 40 percent of a conventional building. Our HVAC system is expected to play a very important role in that project.
In Shanghai, China, is the world’s fastest elevator. It travels 1,230 meters per minute. (The building is called Shanghai Tower and is 2,073 feet tall. It is in the Lujiazui Finance and Trade District of Pudong, Shanghai. It has offices, a hotel, conference and exhibition halls, restaurants and sightseeing.)
Hora: 67 feet per second.
Corbo: 43 miles an hour. It’s twice as fast as the fastest elevator in the United States. It’s over 4,000 feet per minute. In the United States the fastest speed is 2,000 feet per minute.
Sakuyama: You can get from the second basement to the 119th floor in 53 seconds. It’s a smooth ride, too.
Q. The company does a lot of escalators and elevators in Orange County and downtown Los Angeles. Can you elaborate on these projects and what the company’s strategy is for elevators and escalators?
A. Corbo: In South Park (an area with a lot of construction in downtown Los Angeles) and in L.A. Live, the JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton, we are very involved. Following the recession, there was not a lot of work, but a lot of work planned. Now the economy has gotten much better and our elevator and escalator division is doing Oceanwide, a very large project there, right next to L.A. Live and Circa, 1200 S. Figueroa – two high-rise residential towers – and right behind that is 1050 S. Grad, Metropolis Phase I and Phase II, we’re doing.
Sakuyama: The giant screen at Staples Center is also ours.
Corbo: We have a product called Diamond Vision. It’s made by our factory in Pennsylvania. Our screens are at Yankee Stadium, Red Sox, San Francisco Giants, many sports installations across the United States.
In Orange County right now, down in Irvine, there’s 200 and 400 Spectrum Center Drive, two high-rise buildings next to Irvine Spectrum – those both have Mitsubishi elevators. We’ve done a large amount of work for the Irvine Company over the years. If you move up the 405 north, to South Coast Plaza, Henry Segerstrom, in the late ’80s, selected Mitsubishi elevators for Plaza Tower. It was our first monumental project in Orange County. He went on to modernize Center Tower, Park Tower and provide all the offices at South Coast Plaza with Mitsubishi Electric elevators. We also changed the elevators at the retail center. There are two elevators at the Jewel Court that are very unique glass elevators.
Q. What are some of the big trends you are noticing with elevators and escalators?
A. Sakuyama: Most important for people is safety and comfort – quiet and smooth.
Corbo: What we’re really seeing more of are “destination entry systems.” There’s a hall button, but there’s no button in the elevator anymore. You register your floor from the hall and it will tell you what elevator to get in. The elevators know in advance where they’re going. It’s made for more efficient elevator operations.
Sakuyama: You have to ride your designated elevator to reach your destination. The line for the elevator did not just get shorter, it disappeared.
Q. Beyond elevators and escalators, what are some of the other projects you’re working on right now?
A. Corbo: Here on this building (in Cypress) we installed our solar panels. They generate 85 percent of the energy needed for our campus. It was completed several months ago.
Q. Is the company moving toward more green projects?
A. Sakuyama: Feb. 1, 2021, we will mark the 100th anniversary of the establishment of Mitsubishi. By our anniversary we want to be recognized as a company which contributes to making society more green. We want to contribute to natural resource programs and climate change programs. We would like to supply our products, to contribute them to solve those kinds of problems and be recognized as a global leading green company.
Q. Can you tell me more about Mitsubishi Electric’s U.S. Business versus its business in Japan? How do they differ?
A. Sakuyama: Globalization does not mean exporting our country’s products to the world. Instead, in the United States, we have to meet the United States requirements. So we have development groups in Boston, here (Cypress) and Atlanta to meet the requirements of the United States.
Q. What is on the horizon for Mitsubishi Electric?
A. Sakuyama: Our corporate mission is to enhance society with our technology. Currently, the environment is the most important issue.
By taking that kind of policy, I hope we can succeed and grow as a result.
Contact the writer: hmadans@ocregister.com or Twitter: @HannahMadans
