| Nichicon Corporation | |
| Native Name: | ニチコン株式会社 |
| Native Name Lang: | ja |
| Type: | Public KK |
| Traded As: | OSE 6996 |
| Foundation: | |
| Location: | Nakagyo-ku, Kyoto 604-0845, Japan |
| Key People: | Ippei Takeda (Chairman and CEO) Shigeo Yoshida (President and COO) |
| Industry: | Electronics |
| Revenue: | JPY 107.2 billion (FY 2014) (US$ 893.3 million) (FY 2014) |
| Net Income: | JPY 2.25 billion (FY 2014) (US$ 18.7 million) (FY 2014) |
| Num Employees: | 5,792 (consolidated, as of March 31, 2014) |
| Footnotes: | [1] [2] |
is a manufacturer of capacitors of various types, and is one of the largest manufacturers of capacitors in the world, headquartered in Karasuma Oike, Nakagyō-ku, Kyoto, Japan. In 1950, it separated from the Nii Works Co., established itself as Kansai-Nii Works and completed its first factory by 1956. In 1961, it adopted the Nichicon name and has been using it, or a variant thereof, ever since.
In 2011 and 2012 Nichicon spun off several major factories into independent subsidiaries, and established representative branches in foreign countries, thus realigning its corporate infrastructure.[3]
From 2001 to 2004, Nichicon produced defective capacitors ("HM" and "HN" series) that were used by major computer manufacturers, including Dell, Hewlett-Packard, and Apple.[4] No explanation has been given for the production runs of defective capacitors, but some sources claimed that these capacitors were either overfilled with electrolyte,[5] or were constructed using electrolyte that was prone to leaking, causing premature failure in any equipment using them. This issue was not related to the Taiwanese capacitor plague.[5]
In 2010 Dell settled a civil lawsuit concerning its shipment of at least 11.8 million computers from May 2003 to July 2005 that used faulty Nichicon components and were prone to major failure.[6] [7]