The Poor Japanese Boy Who Invented Toyota
Toyota Industries is one of the largest and most famous corporations in the world. It is active in
five business areas namely, automotive, materials handling, electronics, logistics, and textile
machinery. But have you ever heard of the success story of this brand? How it started and how
it was invented by one special person? Today we are going to talk about that one person,
namely, Sakichi Toyoda.
Sakichi Toyoda was the founder of Toyota Industries Corporation and was born the first son of
Ikichi and Ei Toyoda. Sakichi was born in 1867 in Kosai City, Japan. His father, Ikichi was a farmer
who also worked as a carpenter to support his family. Sakichi also began working as an assistant
for his father in the carpentry trade, as soon as he graduated from elementary school. Sakichi
was born in a period generally regarded as the beginning of modern Japan as it was when the
shogunate was replaced by the new government under the Meiji Emperor. During this time, the
entire village where Sakichi was born was plagued with poverty. From the age of 14, Sakichi
started thinking about how he could serve the country while being a useful person to society.
He always read newspapers and magazines when he had no work in his father’s workshops. As
a result of this, he began to promote self-learning by bringing up study groups among the local
youth.
When he turned 18, he learned about the newly approved Patent Monopoly Act. After that, he
invested his efforts into creating something new. His initial thought was to invent a method to
replace steam as the motive force because western civilization was based on steam-powered
machinery. But he was not successful in the use of trial-and-error methods to experiment with
his findings.