Mr. Yasushi Fukunaga

Corporate Chief Engineer
Research & Development Group, Hitachi, Ltd.
Corporate Officer, Hitachi, Ltd.

Yasushi Fukunaga was born in April 1950 in Hyogo, Japan. He received his B.Eng., and M.Eng. in Electrical Engineering from Kyoto University in 1973 and 1975, respectively.

Mr. Fukunaga joined the Hitachi Research Laboratory (HRL) of Hitachi, Ltd. in April 1975, and was originally assigned to the 9th Research Department (computer control systems). During his years as a researcher, he was involved in the research and development of control computers, work stations and pen-based input interfaces. He especially contributed to the development of motor vehicle navigation systems and LSI research. In August 1993, he was appointed as Head of the 1st Department for Systems Research of HRL, responsible for research on computer control platforms. From August 1995 to January 1997, he was involved in the business side of Hitachi, Ltd., supporting the General Manager of Omika Works in the Power & Industrial Systems Group by overseeing the manufacture of industrial computer control systems, after which he returned to HRL as Head of the 1st Department for Information and Control Systems Research. In February 2001, he was appointed as Deputy General Manager of HRL and Head of the IT Applications Center of HRL, and in April 2003, became the 14th General Manager of HRL. In April 2005, he was appointed as the 13th General Manager of the Central Research Laboratory (CRL), and in January 2006, Corporate Officer of Hitachi, Ltd.. He is currently Corporate Chief Engineer of Research & Development Group, Hitachi, Ltd.

As a researcher, Mr. Fukunaga specialized in computer control systems and man-machine interfaces. He is a member of the Institute of Electrical Engineers of Japan (IEE Japan), Information Processing Society of Japan and the Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers (IEICE). In his leisure time, he enjoys reading, hiking and website design.