Sharp 2006 Annual Report Download - page 13

SHARP ANNUAL REPORT 2006 12
Reinforce efforts to protect the environment
Leveraging our energy-creating and energy-saving tech-
nologies, we aim to achieve our corporate vision of being a
company that has “zero global warming impact” by fiscal
2010. We will contribute to the realization of a sustainable
society by pursuing coexistence between business expan-
sion and environmental protection. Specifically, we will work
to reduce the environmental burden at our factories, along
with expanding our range of energy-creating products of
solar cells and energy-saving products such as LCD TVs.
Strengthen business foundations to support innovative
manufacturing
Sharp will strengthen the fundamentals of its manufactur-
ing activities, which we see as a driving force for future growth.
These include establishing an efficient value-chain which
enables production within a short timeframe at low cost and
promoting global procurement activities. We will also enhance
intellectual property strategies by working in close coordina-
tion with R&D and corporate business strategies.
Evolve into an organization with heightened corporate
competitiveness
In an effort to achieve further corporate competitiveness,
Sharp will take measures to improve organizational and indi-
vidual capabilities. Specifically, we will evolve our organiza-
tion to be more capable of swift decision-making with strate-
gic perspective. We will also nurture our core personnel from
a global standpoint and create a working environment for
productive work that brings vitality to the workplace.
Raise shareholder value
Sharp considers distributing profits to shareholders to be
one of the most important management objectives. While
maintaining consistently stable dividend pay-outs, and while
carefully considering our consolidated business performance
and financial situation in a comprehensive manner, we imple-
ment policies to return profits to our shareholders, such as
increasing the amount of periodic dividends. For fiscal 2005,
we distributed a total annual dividend of ¥22 per share, an
increase of ¥2 over the previous year. With this dividend
increase, our dividends have been raised for six consecutive
years from fiscal 2000 through 2005. We plan to increase the
total annual dividend a further ¥2 to ¥24 in fiscal 2006.
To raise the efficiency of shareholder equity and further
enhance shareholder value, Sharp employs a treasury stock sys-
tem, where we consider buying back outstanding shares when
the situation allows and holding the shares as treasury stock.
For the purpose of protecting and increasing corporate
value and benefits for all shareholders, Sharp introduced a
plan regarding large-scale purchases of Sharp Corporation
shares (Anti-Takeover Plan) in April 2006. This plan is a prior
warning type defense measure against potentially hostile
takeover bids. It aims to prevent large-scale purchases of
Sharp’s share certificates or other securities which could
harm corporate value and benefits for all shareholders.
The Sharp Group will proactively practice “one-of-a-kind
management” that pursues creativity and efficiency as a means
to improving corporate value. We also seek to maintain stable
growth as a valued corporate group with a distinguished global
presence. We ask all shareholders for their continued support
as we strive to achieve the goals we have set.
July 2006
Katsuhiko Machida
President