JR Propo / Japan Remote Control Ltd - Gone bankrupt (officially!)

[Grumpy]

I know there has already been lots of speculation that this was the case but it's official now. Formal bankruptcy was filed for in Osaka Japan yesterday 26th December:

Japan Remote Control Co., Ltd. (Capital 3,600,000 yen, Higashi Osaka-shi Eiwa 2-2-12, Registration side = 392 Shirakibucho-cho Matsusaka city, Mr. Akiko Ezaki and 2 others). On the day of December 26 Osaka District Court received a decision to commence bankruptcy proceedings.

Link to the announcement (in Japanese): “|ŽY‘¬•ñ | Š”Ž®‰ïŽÐ ’鍑ƒf[ƒ^ƒoƒ“ƒN[TDB]


How or if this impacts on the RC-Depot business currently distributing JR brand products to the likes of MacGregor in the UK I've no idea?

[DaveG]

Sad but JR lost the plot and dropped the ball years ago, late to every game and then were always playing catch up. The UK distributors didn't help either, never had good dealings with Macgregors.

[coolice]

Hey all.

Here is the response I got from Steve Roberts after I asked him for his input on Facebook;

"Ian- as far as I know this has been on the cards for a while. The good news is that JR never actually made anything and all items were sub contacted out. MacGregor have been dealing directly with the factories for about a year now under licence so parts are still coming and are still from the same source.
But, RC Depot have the rights to most items, have employed some key ex JR staff and seem to be pushing things forward.
So no real need to worry."

Good news it seems for the JR Propo brand, the radio side at least. I hope they keep development going, I know my 28X would love a new firmware :-)

Ian Contessa

[Grumpy]

Hey all.

Here is the response I got from Steve Roberts after I asked him for his input on Facebook;

"Ian- as far as I know this has been on the cards for a while. The good news is that JR never actually made anything and all items were sub contacted out. MacGregor have been dealing directly with the factories for about a year now under licence so parts are still coming and are still from the same source.
But, RC Depot have the rights to most items, have employed some key ex JR staff and seem to be pushing things forward.
So no real need to worry."

Good news it seems for the JR Propo brand, the radio side at least. I hope they keep development going, I know my 28X would love a new firmware :-)

Ian Contessa

Yes, i was informed of the same thing but i'd be worried that this bankruptcy along with the massive dept (4 billion yen / £26 million) might put any 'deal' that JR had with RC Depot under threat. The JR brand name and the manufacturing rights to JR product have some value, so the creditors are likely to want to recover that value however they can. Any deal done shortly before bankruptcy was declared that amount to selling off assets has the potential to be overturned. I guess only time will tell one way or the other.

[Mike656]

This in from JR Americas. Maybe time for MacGregor to chime in?
JRA JR bankruptcy press release 12282017.pdf