Crisis-hit Toshiba Corp yesterday said it would book a net loss for the last fiscal year, as it scrambles to revise its financial records to account for a billion dollar accounting scandal.
The company also announced that it would appoint a host of renowned Japanese business people as outside directors in a management overhaul aimed at improving its corporate culture, which saw high-handed bosses routinely pressure their subordinates to inflate profits.
Toshiba said it expected to record a net loss for the fiscal year ended March, although it was not able to provide an exact figure.
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The company also said it expected to report annual sales of ¥6.66 trillion (US$53.58 billion) and an operating profit of ¥170 billion for that year.
In a bid to beef up its corporate governance, the company also announced it would expand the number of outside directors from four to seven, including a former supreme court justice along with a number of well-known business leaders from other major firms.
The 140-year-old conglomerate has been hammered by revelations that top executives pressured underlings to systematically inflate profits by about US$1.2 billion since the 2008 global financial crisis.
One of the most damaging accounting scandals to hit Japan in recent years, the case prompted an incumbent president and seven other top executives to resign last month after a company-hired panel found top management complicit in a years-long scheme to pad profits.
Toshiba is set to hold an extraordinary shareholders meeting next month to discuss the new board members as well as its plans to improve its corporate culture.
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