History Of Outboard Marine Corporation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC)
was a maker of Evinrude, Johnson and
Gale Outboard Motors boat motors and many different brands of boats.
It was a multibillion-dollar Fortune 500 corporation.
Evinrude began in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin in
1907. OMC was based in Waukegan, Illinois.
They also owned several lines of boats such as Chris Craft, Lowe Boats, Princecraft,
Four Winns, SeaSwirl, Stratos, and Javelin.
OMC was also a parent company to Ryan, which made lawn mowers.
OMC sold 100,000 motors in 2000 and had one third of the outboard market. OMC
filed for bankruptcy 22 December 2000 and laid off 7,000 employees.
The Johnson and Evinrude brands were won by bid in February 2001 by Bombardier
Recreational Products and
the boat division by Genmar
Holdings of Minnesota. The former OMC plant #2 in Waukegan, Illinois
is now a Superfund cleanup
site.
Outboard Marine Corporation sometimes referred to as Outboard Motor Company was
formed in 1929 when ELTO was
merged with Lockwood-Ash Motor Company. They
began using the name OMC in 1956. Outboard
Marine Corporation was the world's largest manufacturer and supplier of outboard
motors and second largest producer of powerboats.
Based in Waukegan,
Illinois the
company had become famous for its brand-name Johnson and Evinrude outboard
motors, as well as its Chris-Craft and Grumman powerboats.
Other products under the brand names of
Four Winns, Seaswirl, Trade Winds, Sunbird, Stratos, and Hydra-Sports include
fiberglass runabouts, cruisers, performance boats, and craft for offshore
fishing. Outboard Marine also marketed
clothing for boating, and resort wear. Unfortunately,
during the late 1980s and early 1990s, Outboard Marine had a difficult time
keeping up with the competition, notably archrival Brunswick
Corporation
(Mercury Marine), currently the world's largest manufacturer of
powerboats.
Motorized transport was just becoming an everyday part of life in 1907, when Ole
Evinrude first
mass-produced a practical outboard engine for boats.
Evinrude placed an advertisement in a
motor magazine to introduce his motor, drawing so many inquiries from U.S. and
overseas readers that he decided to try large-scale production. Needing
financial help with this undertaking, he found a backer and established the Evinrude
Motor Company in
1910.
The business was an instant success—its market included not only recreational
boaters but also the Scandinavian fishing fleets operating in the North Sea.
Friction between the partners forced
Evinrude to sell his share to his backer in 1914 and depart, after signing a
guarantee restricting him from the outboard motor industry for five years.
The company continued without him,
becoming a subsidiary of the gasoline-engine manufacturer Briggs
& Stratton Corporation
in 1926.
By 1921, Evinrude was back in business, in a venture he called the ELTO Outboard
Motor Company. His new offering was the
Evinrude Light Twin Outboard, a motor partly made of aluminum, reducing its
weight by a third. Popular with the
fishing fleets, this revolutionary engine outstripped sales of Evinrude's
original outboard motor within three years. It
also attracted the attention of a competitor, Johnson
Motor Company,
which brought out its rival lightweight engine in 1922.
Johnson gained market share, snatching
the lead four years later with an updated model weighing a trim 100 pounds,
costing a thrifty $190, and able to drive a boat at a zippy 16 miles per hour.
Neither the Evinrude Company nor ELTO
could match this. Now far ahead, Johnson
produced a net profit of $433,000 in 1927, far outpacing Evinrude's $25,000 and
ELTO's $30,000.
A new engine in 1928 restored the ELTO Company, whose annual net profit rose to
$300,000. Ole Evinrude merged ELTO with
Stephen Briggs the following year when he and Harold Stratton disagreed over
diversifying Briggs & Stratton into the outboard engine market.
Mr. Briggs became chairman of the
brand-new Outboard Motors Corporation, with Mr. Evinrude as the President.
Outboard scarcely had time to find its feet before the stock market crash of
1929 tested its staying power. Already
responsible for $500,000 in bank loans as a result of the merger, the company
had to increase its debt to $600,000 between 1930 and 1932, when operating
deficits totaled $550,000. To keep the
business afloat, the entire inventory was sold at bargain prices, and Evinrude
sacrificed his salary until his death in 1934.
Johnson's fate was worse. A too-costly
advertising campaign, as well as an ill-timed offering of matched motors and
hulls, drained all cash reserves by 1930, when control of the company passed to
its bankers. Next came an attempt to lessen its reliance on seasonal sales by
entry into the refrigerator-compressor market. This
last-ditch effort did not revive the business, and shortly thereafter Johnson
was for sale.
In 1935, the Outboard Motors Corporation bought the Johnson Motor Company.
Its $800,000 price tag brought Outboard
a well-known line of outboards and plant and equipment worth $1.5 million.
It also brought Outboard established
overseas markets in China, Burma, Iran, and Albania, to broaden Evinrude's array
of dealers in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.
Another plus was Johnson's niche in the
refrigeration market; Outboard
established the Gale Products Division at Galesburg,
Illinois,
to manufacture this new line.
Expansion brought changes. No longer
devoted to purely marine interests, the company changed its name in 1936, to the
Outboard Marine & Manufacturing Company. Stephen
F. Briggs resigned his Outboard chairmanship temporarily—he had held this
position since 1929 to take the Johnson helm. He
instituted a rigorous cost-cutting regime, and by 1937 the Johnson division's
gross sales were $4.3 million, as compared with Evinrude-ELTO's $2.5 million.
By now, Outboard Motors accounted for about 60 percent of U.S. outboard motor
production. There were three engine
lines, suiting most needs: the ELTO line for the buyer seeking thrift;
Evinrude, the prestige line; and
Johnson, offering special features. Though
there was cooperation, operations were largely independent.
This left each division to award
contracts to outside bidders as well as those sharing a place under the Outboard
umbrella. Even export sales operations
were handled differently; although they were all routed through the Waukegan
headquarters, Johnson tended to sell directly to its dealers, while most
Evinrude sales were passed through distributors and then to the dealers.
In addition to the engines, selling mostly in seasonal markets, there were other
items broadening the product lines. The Lawn-Boy lawnmower
had been an Evinrude staple since 1932, along with pumps for drainage,
firefighting, and lawn spraying. Offerings
from Johnson included small generators, a gasoline engine for washing machines,
and refrigerators. In combination with
the motors, all these produced net sales of $6.8 million by 1937, generating
profits of $945,000.
In the early 1940s, Outboard's facilities were all converted to the production
of war materials. Bomb fuses, aircraft
engines, and firefighting apparatus flowed from the Outboard factories, along
with landing-boat motors for the Navy. Evinrude
four-cylinder engines carried troops across the Rhine.
Net sales for 1945 reached $1.8 million,
topping $2.5 million the following year.
The personnel who steered the company through the hectic war years were Outboard
oldtimers. In addition to Briggs, there
was Joseph G. Rayniak, director of manufacturing research, whose career dated
back to the Johnson brothers' 2 horsepower Light Twin, unveiled in 1922. There
was Finn T. Irgens, holder of 92 patents, who had risen to be director of
engineering from a start with Ole Evinrude, in 1929.
There was Ralph Evinrude, who had
succeeded to the company presidency after his father's death in 1934.
These longtime staff members were all on hand with the return of peacetime, when
the company converted its facilities back to the production of Johnson and
Evinrude outboard motors. Spending $8
million on plant expansion and improvement by 1952, Outboard then offered models
ranging from one-cylinder, 3 horsepower engines to two-cylinder, 25 horsepower
models.
Several acquisitions broadened the Outboard product line during the 1950s.
The first, in 1952, was RPM
Manufacturing Company of Missouri, whose specialty was a rotary power mower that
Outboard planned to sell under its familiar Lawn-Boy trade-name.
Featuring a detachable engine useful as an outboard, the mower was
already a best-selling unbranded item in both the Sears and the Spiegel
catalogs. Outboard coped with the huge
volume of existing orders by completing entire units in one factory, rather than
using the more time-consuming method of piecemeal assembly in several locations.
In 1956, the company changed its name to Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC).
The same year, OMC purchased Industrial
Engineering, Canada's largest chain-saw manufacturer, for C$2.55 million plus
40,000 shares. OMC moved this new
subsidiary to Peterborough, Ontario, and changed the name Industrial
Engineering to Pioneer Saws Ltd.
Cushman (company) of
Nebraska joined the company subsidiary list in 1957.
Well known in the utility vehicle field,
Cushman had manufactured the Airborne, a motor scooter dropped by parachute for
ground transport of paratroopers. Later
the company's lightweight vehicles became popular for agricultural, industrial,
and recreational use. Costing 114,000
shares at 30¢ par, the new acquisition added three-wheel mail carriers, golf
carts, and motor scooters to the OMC product line.
Besides the Johnson and Evinrude motors
then being sold by about 7,000 retail dealers, the swelling list of OMC
offerings included Gale Buccaneer motors sold through hardware jobbers, as well
as a number of unbranded models sold for retailers.
The company's most innovative engine appeared in 1958. The first mass-produced
die-cast aluminum engine, it was a four-cylinder, 50 horsepower outboard,
completely manufactured by OMC, its V-blocks came from Johnson, its steel parts
from Evinrude, while the Gale division contributed its carburetors and ignition
systems.
Export sales of all items surged ahead during the 1950s.
Seeing a 215 percent gain in exports
between 1949 and 1956, OMC expanded its export department in 1956, gaining a new
subsidiary called Outboard Marine International S.A.
By 1960, taking the next logical step
of overseas production, the company was manufacturing and assembling motors in
Brugge, Belgium. All these developments
showed in the annual net sales, which soared from $27 million in 1950 to $171.5
million by 1959.
During the 1950s, OMC's main objective had been acquisitions to broaden basic
product lines. In the 1960s, the
company's aim was to improve all these products and find growing markets for
them. Ensuring its industry leadership
by constant innovation and improvement to existing products, OMC allocated more
than $7 million annually to research and development.
As the 1960s began, the United States was in the trough of a recession.
First-time buyers as well as those
seeking bigger and better leisure-time equipment put their purchases on hold.
Because its principal markets were tied
to leisure-time activities mostly practiced on a seasonal basis, OMC sales sank
to a 1961 low of $132.3 million.
The economic turndown did not, however, prevent the company from starting a
five-year philanthropic program in 1961. In
response to a request to benefit the United
Nations Food and Agriculture Organization's
freedom-from-hunger campaign, OMC contributed several hundred outboard engines
each year to be used in fishing, part of a program to increase food production
in underdeveloped countries. Also in
1961, the company established the OMC Boats Division to produce and market 16-
to 19-foot boats featuring both outboard and the newer stern-drive engines.
Production began the following year,
helping to raise sales to $151.9 million by 1962.
The stern-drive, or inboard-outboard motors, were available both as separate
units for boat-builders, or as components of boats produced by OMC.
Built to give the fuel economy and
dependability of inboard engines, they were nevertheless as versatile as
outboards. By 1965 the company was
selling only about 20,000 stern drives a year, however, and sales of the
outboards were still outpacing them tenfold. The problem stemmed from the
engine's state-of-the-art technology; many dealers did not know how to repair
these motors, and owners were often ignorant of maintenance needs.
OMC met this challenge by developing
computerized week-long repair and maintenance
classes for dealer training. Four
schools, two permanently stationed in San Francisco, California, and Waukegan,
Illinois, and two mobile units familiarized customers with the new engines.
During the 1960s, public interest in novel sports offered new market potential.
Alert to novel trends, OMC entered the
snowmobile industry with enthusiasm, introducing the Evinrude Skeeter and the
Johnson Skee-Horse in 1964, each sure to thrill riders with speeds of more than
30 miles per hour. Another innovation
was the Evinrude Aquanaut for skin diving, also sold under the Johnson tradename
Air-Buoy. Consisting of a floating
gasoline-powered compressor, the unit supplied air to two masked divers at the
same time. Another breakthrough was the
loop-charged outboard, devised after the company went back to powerboat racing
for the first time since World War II.
By October 1967, OMC's fiscal year-end sales had reached $233.4 million.
Of this amount, 10 percent came from
power mowers, with golf carts and utility vehicles sharing second place at 7
percent, and with snowmobiles, the fastest-growing segment of the business, also
at 7 percent. Chain saw sales accounted
for 4 percent of the final figure, while a full 70 percent came from marine
products. The only failure of the decade
was the boat-building enterprise; initially small operating losses grew each
year, until the line was sold to Chris-Craft in 1970.
Otherwise, the 1960s had been lucrative, as the 1969 net sales figure of
$327.1 million showed.
The 1970s began with a dip to $304.5 million in net sales.
This was partly due to the unprofitable
boat line, and partly to a line of tent campers that had never fulfilled
expectations after the 1967 acquisition of their manufacturer, Trade Winds
Campers. The company discontinued the
line in 1971, and immediately saw the improvement in their net sales figures,
which soared to $394 million by 1972.
There were other disappointments.
Golf cart sales sank to 2 percent of overall revenue by 1974, and were
discontinued in 1975. Chain saw
sales totaled $19.1 million in 1976, resulting in losses for the company and
reflecting a flattening of future market potential.
OMC discontinued them the following year.
Snowmobiles, constituting about 4 percent of sales volume in 1972, were
offered in 1973 with an optional Wankel engine costing about $235 more than the
conventional motor. Though this was
the United States's first introduction to the revolutionary rotary engine,
OMC's hopes of success were dashed by heavy competition from other
snowmobile brands, as well as by two winters of sparse snow.
Snowmobile production came to an end in 1976, after a fiscal 1974
operating loss of $13.9 million.
Fuel shortages were another downside. Coming
to an OPEC-inspired zenith in 1973, they brought fears of a buying slowdown in
the peak spring quarter. An OMC
environmental executive warned of possible gasoline rationing by the petroleum
industry, and outlined steps for fuel conservation among boaters.
In the same year, OMC purchased a five-acre site in Hong Kong. Intended as a
first step towards larger outboard motor markets in Asia, the move was also
encouraged by a Hong Kong government program designed to attract specific,
technologically advanced industries. Assembly operations
began in the plant in 1975, with the manufacture of electronic outboard motor
components following two years later.
In 1974, Charles
D. Strang succeeded
W. C. Scott as president. Strang's
interest in powerboats, beginning in boyhood, had lasted through college and a
post as a research associate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
During a later period of employment with
the makers of Mercury outboard motors, interest had deepened into vocation.
In 1966 his experience in the powerboat
industry had brought him to OMC. Eight
years later he rose to the presidency.
An environmental question was one of his first challenges.
It began in 1976, when OMC was cited by
both the U.S. and Illinois environmental protection agencies for polluting a
drainage ditch and Waukegan harbor with polychlorinated
biphenyls (PCBs).
The company filed suit against both
agencies after lengthy negotiations, charging that the federal government had
dragged its feet in spending funds authorized for pollution-control use.
Company attorneys also stated that the
PCB-contaminated pipes had been replaced in 1976, but the agencies likewise
filed suit, asking that the company be ordered to remove the contaminants from
the harbor, and to pay a maximum penalty of about $20 million, reflecting a
$10,000 fine for each day the PCB sources had been in place.
This suit was to dog OMC's footsteps
throughout the 1980s.
Reorganizing his domestic operations was another Strang priority, with bringing
together the Evinrude and Johnson divisions at the top of the list.
Complete separation of the two since the
company's beginnings had fostered an intense rivalry between them, along with
disregard for competition by manufacturers outside the company.
To unite the company against outside
competitors, in 1978 Strang centralized all domestic manufacturing operations at
the corporate headquarters in Waukegan, Illinois, charging vice president James
C. Chapman with responsibility for their coordination, as well as for
manufacturing policy.
Next came long-range plans for dealing with the competitors themselves.
Chief among these were the Japanese firm
Yamaha, eating into OMC's European market, and Brunswick Corporation, makers of
premium-priced Mercury outboards. A
joint venture between Yamaha and Brunswick had produced a low-cost engine called
Mariner; thus Brunswick then had an engine at both high and low ends of the
market, leaving OMC sandwiched in the middle. With
his newly united company behind him, Strang cleared this hurdle by slashing
prices by 25 percent and also by making sure that all products offered by
competitors were available in the OMC lineup. In
another move, he bought out independent distributors overseas, thus gaining
greater control over foreign marketing operations.
Threatening OMC's competitiveness was a 1980 Department of Energy proposal that
boating be banned on weekends. As a
result of this suggestion, public concern about gasoline shortages caused OMC's
net sales to plummet to $687.4 million in 1980, from $741.2 million just one
year earlier. It was not easy to
maintain the company's competitive edge against the Japanese at this time, but
Strang slashed budgets, reducing his work force by one-third, to save an annual
pretax amount of $47 million. The reward for this effort showed at the end of
fiscal 1982, when net sales reached $778 million.
OMC was now in a position to spend $100 million on the construction and tooling
of nine new plants. Contrary to previous
practice, each plant was designed to specialize in one manufacturing function.
In addition, overseas plants were
refined to reduce operations costs and provide more efficient handling and
storage. OMC made PCBs from 1954 to 1982
Streamlining made product innovation easier. Power
steering, variable-ratio oiling—delivering exact mixtures of gasoline and oil to
the engine—and saltwater protection were new features appreciated by powerboat
buyers. Starting in 1983, OMC began to
prepare the way for a new stern-drive engine, to supersede previous models.
After reviewing the stern-drive market,
the company sent interviewers to dealers and service department personnel,
gathering information for the ideal stern-drive engine.
The result was the OMC Cobra, introduced
in 1985. Designed for both boat builders
and consumers, its 7.5 liter engine delivered 340 horsepower.
In 1984, James Chapman stepped into the presidency of the company, succeeding
Robert F. Wallace, whose short tenure had lasted from January 1982.
Like his predecessors, Chapman grappled
with the Waukegan Harbor question. This
issue was finally laid to rest in April 1989, when the U.S. Department of
Justice ordered OMC to fund a trust to remove the pollutants from Lake Michigan.
This was just the beginning of OMC's problems, however.
In 1988, the boat market peaked and then
went into a tailspin. Although Chapman
decided to purchase 15 boatmakers to assure OMC of captive customers for their
outboard engines, the company did not develop a comprehensive or well-designed
strategy to manage its growing operations efficiently.
In the middle of the worst downturn in
the industry's history, Chapman sold Lawnboy and Cushman for $235 million in
1989 to raise much-needed cash. In
addition, he reduced staff, closed factories, and eliminated whole product
lines, such as Chris-Craft engines and boat models—all to no avail.
Between 1990 and 1993, OMC suffered
losses totaling $440 million.
In 1989, OMC purchased some of the holdings of Murray Industries, Inc., makers
of Chris-Craft boats. That same year,
OMC sold off Lawn-Boy and Cushman. The
sales netted a combined $248 million in cash for OMC.
One portion of the money was used for
capital improvements for its boatbuilding facilities while another portion was
invested in building a new Suncruiser aluminum pontoon boat.
Despite the large expenditures, OMC’s
decision to focus on boatbuilding proved to be a good one.
OMC was able to pair boats with
appropriately powered outboards and sales of boat packages doubled within a
one-year timeframe.
Smaller and quieter V-6s were introduced in 1991 in the form of the Evinrude
Spitfire and the Johnson Silver-Star series. These
outboards featured a new flushing device that could be used to flush the engine
with fresh water while it was running. The
Spitfire and Silver-Star models also used an infra-red sensor system called
Optical Ignition System (OIS 2000). This
system automatically advanced the engine timing to eliminate unwanted timing
changes. Other advancements in 1991
included smaller, more fuel efficient diesel stern drive models. The OMC Cobra
Diesel was a 970-pound, 3.2 liter, six-cylinder monoblock inline powerhouse that
produced 205-hp at 4300 rpm.
Electronic Fuel Injection (EFI) was introduced on select OMC drive systems in
1993, representing the first time that EFI was available to recreational stern
drive customers. With the previous
carbureted systems, boaters had to endure a nine-step starting sequence.
With the EFI, boaters had only to turn
the key and shift into gear.
By 1993, OMC had more than 20 brands in the marketplace, ranging from canoes to
cruisers. Operations were divided into
three groups – the Fishing Boat Group, the Recreational Boat Group, and the
Aluminum Boat Group. Each group was
responsible for all manufacturing and marketing efforts associated with its line
of products. The Fishing Boat Group
included Stratos, Hydra-Sports, Javelin and Quest by Four Winns.
The Recreational Boat Group produced 80
models under the brand names Chris-Craft, Donzi, Four Winns,[6] Seaswirl
and Sunbird. The Aluminum Boat Group
included Duranautic,[7] Princecraft/Springbok,
Suncruiser, Lowe, Sea Nymph, Grumman, and Roughneck.
Many of these same brands are still in
production today.
As OMC continued to lose money, Harry Bowman, the former CEO of Whirlpool
Corporation,
was hired to replace Chapman. When the
boat industry finally rebounded from its economic downturn in 1994, OMC did not
have enough of the right kind of product for its customers since much of it had
been sold by Chapman. Bowman immediately
formed a joint venture with Volvo to
consolidate two engines into one brand name, finalized a contract with a German
firm to bring in new technology for high-pressure fuel injectors so that OMC
engines could be more fuel-efficient, initiated a thoroughgoing advertising
campaign to strengthen its brand name Evinrude and Johnson outboard engines, and
began to develop a new generation of outboard motors that were environmentally
acceptable, fuel-efficient, and easily repaired. Bowman's strategy worked.
By the middle of 1995, OMC's revenues
were $1.1 billion.
The company faced net revenue losses of $7.3 million in the 2nd quarter of 1997
ending March 31 and would have been worse if $2 million in dividends were not
suspended. The previous quarter loss was
$14.3 million even after selling assets such as the corporate jet. In April 1997
OMC hired Salomon
Brothers to
explore future option such as a buyout or merger.
In 1997 Detroit
Diesel made
a $16 a share bid for OMC. They were outbid at $18 a share by Alfred Kingsley
who previously owned 2 million shares purchased at $17 a share and had no
experience in the outboard industry. The
deal was backed by George
Soros. Carl
Icahn,
a corporate raider who bought TWA in
1988, is said to blame Kingsley his lieutenant during the 1980s for the ensuing
TWA bankruptcy a few years later. David
Jones - former Mercury
Marine Division
president until August 1997 - was hired by Kingsley in September 1997 to become
the President and CEO of OMC, but resigned in August 2000 due to financial
turmoil at OMC. In March 1998 OMC
laid off 200 employees after earlier laying off 348.
In September 1998 OMC announced the closure of their Milwaukee, Wisconsin and
Waukegan, IL plants over the next two years.
OMC released the 1997 FICHT fuel injected motor in 1996 to meet stiffer EPA
guidelines. This motor used Gasoline
Direct Injection developed
by Ficht GmbH Germany. This motor had
problems due to the transition phase of operation being exactly at the same
trolling speed of many fishermen and had problems early on, and the smoking and
knocking of these engines, along with many pistons and rods exploding out the
sides of the engine block, created an aura of doom to potential new customers.
Some outboard motor industry insiders
have speculated the rush to meet EPA standards helped with the undoing of OMC.
OMC press release 22
December 2000
WAUKEGAN, Ill., Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC)
Outboard Marine Corporation and several of its subsidiaries today filed for
voluntary reorganization under Chapter 11 of the US Bankruptcy Code in US
Bankruptcy Court in Chicago. OMC has
sought protection under Chapter 11 so that the company can implement its plans
to sell some or all of its engine and boat operations. OMC also announced a
significant reduction in its North American workforce affecting salaried and
hourly employees at all of its operations.
OMC stressed that the company expects to continue operations during the
reorganization process.
OMC has requested that the Bankruptcy Court allow the company to continue
compensation and benefit plans for its remaining employees, maintain customer
sales, support and service activities, and make post-petition payments due to
suppliers in the ordinary course of business.
OMC said it has received a commitment from its bank group to provide debtor-in-possession
financing totaling
$35 million, which is expected to be sufficient to permit the company to operate
while it implements its restructuring plan.
The company has the support for this course of action from its major investors.
The company said the filing has been made in order to enable OMC to complete the
sale of its boat and engine operations under Court supervision.
OMC said it intends to do everything it
can to expedite this process and to consummate a beneficial transaction as
quickly as possible.
OMC said that the reduction in force affects approximately 4,000 employees at
its boat and engine operations in North America.
Outboard Marine Corporation is a leading manufacturer and marketer of
internationally known boat brands, including Chris-Craft(R), Four Winns(R),
Seaswirl(R), Javelin(R), Stratos(R), Lowe(R), Hydra-Sports(R) and Princecraft;
marine accessories and marine engines, under the brand names of Johnson(R) and
Evinrude(R); and Ficht Ram Injection(R) — the world's premier low-emission
two-stroke outboard engine technology.
SOURCE Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC) Web Site: omc-online.com