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He turned Suzuki Motor into a Japanese global logo that makes small cars and motorcycles. Entering the Indian market in the 1980s was one of his first successes.
By the Akira Davis River and Kiuko Notoya
Report from Tokyo
Osamu Suzuki, who led Japanese automaker Suzuki Motor for more than four decades and became a global powerhouse, died Wednesday in Shizuoka prefecture, southwest of Tokyo, at age 94.
Suzuki Motor said in a statement that the cause of his death, which occurred in hospital, was malignant lymphoma.
Mr. Suzuki served as president of Suzuki Motor from 1978 to 2000 and held other senior positions within the company from time to time. His tenure at the helm for nearly half a century made him one of the longest-serving executives at any major automaker.
Under his leadership, Suzuki Motor grew from a relatively small company with sales of a few billion dollars annually to what it is today: a leading maker of small vehicles and motorcycles with revenues of more than $30 billion a year because of its strong position in overseas markets like India.
Mr. Suzuki, the fourth child of a farming family, was born on January 30, 1930, in Gifu Prefecture, west of Tokyo. After earning a law degree from Chuo University in 1953, he worked in a bank until he met his long-time wife, Shoko Suzuki, a member of the automaker’s founding family. They married in the late 1950s and he took his wife’s surname, a common practice among leading Japanese families.
Suzuki rose through the management ranks and became president two decades after joining the company in 1958.
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