ChuoAoyama PricewaterhouseCoopers will receive an expert team from its U.S. partner to get advice on and update auditing knowhow, according to sources.

The move is part of efforts by one of Japan's four major auditing houses to improve its capacity, after it failed to prevent Kanebo Ltd. from falsifying financial statements in the 2001 and 2002 business years, the sources said.

While pushing for various steps, including increasing its auditing staff by a large number and placing priority on auditing client companies, ChuoAoyama is seeking to acquire global-standard auditing knowhow through cooperation from the PricewaterhouseCoopers group of the U.S., the sources said.

The U.S. auditing group has more than 120,000 employees in more than 140 countries and audits the books of a number of multinational companies.

ChuoAoyama has been in a business partnership with PricewaterhouseCoopers since 1984.

Last fall, ChuoAoyama found four of its certified public accountants had collaborated with top Kanebo officials, a long-established cosmetics and textile maker, in the accounting fraud.