Sanyo Electric Co. will tap academic expertise to improve its personnel management system through joint projects with Cambridge University, Hong Kong University and France's INSEAD business school, company officials said Monday.
The home electronics maker will borrow the schools' knowhow for personnel training and recruitment of foreign staff in return for providing them with information related to the company's personnel management system.
Joint projects will include studies on the difference between Japanese and foreign companies in appointing locally hired employees to managerial jobs at their overseas affiliates, an area in which Japanese firms are believed to lag behind.
Sanyo hopes the tieups will benefit its management of day-to-day business operations. It also plans to present track records of such studies to academic conferences and sell them to other companies, the company officials said.
Similar arrangements with other academic institutions at home and abroad will be considered in the future, they said.