Hitachi senior vice president named new president

Toshiaki Higashihara, a senior vice president of Hitachi Ltd., will be promoted to president on April 1, the company said Wednesday. Higashihara, 58, who serves as an executive officers, is in charge of Hitachi's medical and infrastructure systems business. After being replaced by him, Hiroaki Nakanishi, 67, would become chairman and chief executive officers. Under the new leadership, Hitachi aims to enhance its infrastructure business overseas. It aims to achieve group sales of 10 trillion yen (95.5 billion U.S. dollars) in the business year ending March 2016 under its medium-term business plan through fiscal 2015. "I would like to place emphasis on strengthening the foundations of growth in order to solidify our growth path," Higashihara told a news conference in Tokyo, aiming to catch up with global giants like Siemens AG of Germany and General Electric Co. of the United States. For the business year through March, the company is expecting a group operating profit of 500 billion yen (4.77 billion U.S. dollars), bolstered by upbeat infrastructure business, the yen's weakening and cost-cutting efforts, close to its record high level.