Shimano

, originally Shimano Iron Works and later Shimano Industries, Inc., is a Japanese multinational manufacturing company for cycling components, fishing tackle and rowing equipment, who also produced golf supplies until 2005 and snowboarding gear until 2008. Named after founder Shozaburo Shimano (島野庄三郎, 1894–1958) and headquartered in Sakai, Osaka Prefecture, the company has 32 consolidated and 11 unconsolidated subsidiaries, with the primary manufacturing plants based in Kunshan (China), Malaysia and Singapore. In 2017, Shimano had net sales of US $3.2 billion, 38% in Europe, 35% in Asia, and 11% in North America. Bicycle components represented 80%, fishing tackle 19%, and other products 0.1%. The company is publicly traded, with 93 million shares of common stock outstanding. They are also the official neutral support for most of the UCI World Tour. Shimano sales constitute an estimated 70–80% of the global bicycle component market by value. Its products include drivetrain, brake, wheel and pedal components for road, mountain, track and hybrid bikes. The components include cranksets comprising cranks and chainrings; bottom brackets; chains; rear chain sprockets and cassettes; front and rear wheel hubs; gear shift levers; brakes; brake levers; cables; front and rear dérailleurs. Shimano Total Integration (STI) is Shimano's integrated shifter and brake lever combination for road bicycles. The Italian firm Campagnolo as well as US based SRAM are Shimano's primary competitors in the cycling marketplace. When the 1970s United States bike boom exceeded the capacity of the European bicycle component manufacturers, Japanese manufacturers SunTour and Shimano rapidly stepped in to fill the void. While both companies provided products for all price-ranges of the market, SunTour also focused on refinement of existing systems and designs for higher-end products, while Shimano initially paid more attention to rethinking the basic systems and bringing out innovations such as Positron shifting (a precursor to index shifting) and front freewheel systems at the low end of the market.