Panasonic Brand Replaces Matsushita Electric Corporate Name in North America

Panasonic Brand Replaces Matsushita Electric Corporate Name in North America

Renaming is Part of Global Brand Strengthening

SECAUCUS, N.J., Dec. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- The Panasonic brand is about to go corporate. Matsushita Electric Corporation of America, the North American headquarters of Osaka, Japan-based Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. (NYSE:MC), will soon formally take on its best known brand name as its corporate name. As of January 1, the company will be known as Panasonic Corporation of North America.

"Panasonic is the name that customers and channel partners have known us by for years," said company chairman Yoshi Yamada. "We want to take advantage of the tremendous brand equity and good will that research tells us is built into the Panasonic name, so it makes great sense to call our company Panasonic. In addition, we are also in the midst of a huge transformation of our company's systems and organization. By putting the Panasonic name on the revitalized company, we want to underline the dynamic change going on within the organization."

In all, nearly 50 Matsushita entities in the U.S. and Mexico, ranging from Matsushita Electric Corporation of America headquarters in New Jersey to factories and research and development units, will take on the Panasonic name between January 1, 2005, through December 2005. For example, the world's leading integrator of in-flight entertainment systems, Matsushita Avionics Systems Corporation, based in Bothell, Wash., and known in the industry as MAS, will be renamed Panasonic Avionics Corporation on April 1, 2005. And in Columbus, Ga., Matsushita-Ultra Tech. Battery Corporation, a battery-making joint venture with Kodak, will change its name to Panasonic Primary Battery Corporation of America on the same day. And the company's plasma TV R&D base in Highland, N.Y., Plasmaco, Inc., will become Panasonic Plasma Display Laboratory of America, Inc., on January 1, 2005.

Similar changes in corporate naming will take place in Matsushita Electric subsidiary companies in Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and Oceania, and South America over the same period. The Matsushita corporate name, which comes from company founder Konosuke Matsushita, will be retained by the parent company and its subsidiaries in Japan where it is widely known and respected and its association with the Panasonic brand is well understood.

About Panasonic

Matsushita Electric Corporation of America markets a broad line of digital and other electronics products for consumer, business, and industrial needs. Based in Secaucus, N.J., it is the hub of Panasonic's marketing, sales, service and R&D operations in the U.S. Additional information is available at http://www.panasonic.com/.


Source: Panasonic

CONTACT: Will Safer, +1-201-392-6124, saferw@us.panasonic.com, or Bill
Pritchard, +1-201-348-7182, pritchardw@us.panasonic.com, both of Panasonic

Web site: http://www.panasonic.com/


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