The carmaker behind Subaru also builds the middle of Boeing's wings
Subaru Corporation is known for cars, yet its aerospace arm makes the centre wing sections of Boeing 777 and 787 airliners, plus military helicopters and trainer aircraft for Japan. For decades the same company also built subway cars, buses, garbage trucks, wind turbines and millions of engines for snowmobiles.
The business descends from Nakajima Aircraft, a major wartime supplier of planes to Japan's government. Occupation authorities broke Nakajima apart, and on July 15, 1953, five of the fragments, among them a scooter maker, a coachbuilder and a chassis builder, combined as Fuji Heavy Industries. That name lasted until April 1, 2017, when the firm formally became Subaru Corporation, having already adopted the car division's logo as its corporate emblem in 2003.
Its aerospace division still works under licence from Boeing and Lockheed Martin and sells to Japan's defence establishment. Over the years it has produced the T-1 jet trainer of 1958, the FA-200 Aero Subaru light plane of 1965 and a series of primary trainers, and it contributes parts to the Airbus A380 as well as several Boeing models. In June 2014 it was one of five Japanese companies signed to make components for the 777X. The division is also slated to maintain the V-22 Osprey tiltrotor.
Rail was another sideline. The company built diesel railcars for JR Hokkaido, trains for Tobu Railway and cars for the Tokyo subway, then quit both buses and rolling stock in 2003. Its industrial products unit started making engines for Polaris snowmobiles in 1968; Polaris switched to engines of its own in 1998, but Subaru had by then supplied more than 2 million engines for Polaris machines and still sells it pistons. The engine, pump and generator business closed in 2017.
Cars nonetheless dominated revenue. By the late 1980s they brought in 80% of sales, and after sales dropped 15% in 1989 the company lost over US$500 million in 1990, prompting Nissan, then a small shareholder, to install a new chief. General Motors held 20.1% from 1999, and Toyota bought 8.7% of that stake in October 2005, soon arranging to assemble Camrys at Subaru's Indiana factory.
Source: Subaru Corporation
