Kotani a prominent face in Japan s robotics industry
Photos courtesy of Yushin Precision Equipment Co. Ltd.
Mayumi Kotani is part of the 2021 Plastics Hall of Fame class. She is just the fourth woman to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Mayumi Kotani grew up in southern Japan, in Kyoto prefecture, where women and men carried an equal load.
In her small fishing village, about 100 meters from the sea, her mother was an active worker, being the head of a local nursery school. Her father was in the military before starting his own business.
So when she began work at the company her husband founded, Kyoto-based Yushin Precision Equipment Co. Ltd., a leading maker of take-out robots for injection molded products, she was used to being the only woman in the room. She has served as the president of the company since 2002, 12 years as vice president before then, and a total of 48 years as an executive.