Steven wrote:
"Miyata never bought the company. Two separate companies in partnership.
Koga-Miyata was under Dutch ownership, not Japanese ownership.
Frames may have been supplied by Miyata, but they are not the same company.
It's like saying that Giant and Schwinn were the same company in the late 1980s because Giant supplied most of Schwinn's frames ..."
I cannot agree with these statements. From what I have been able to dig up through my old-time Miyata contacts, Koga-Miyata was not Dutch-owned in 1981-2. It was a joint venture between Koga and Miyata, with Miyata holding at least half of the shares in the company. 100 % of the frames in the listed period were built by Miyata in Japan. The frames were also fully designed in-house by Miyata. Koga limited itself to spec them out to meet their market price points and requirements. Furthermore, the brand "Koga-Miyata", outside of Europe, was of exclusive ownership of Miyata. All this leads to the fact that Miyata was the one calling the shots within Koga-Miyata in the early 1980's, therefore the comparison of Giant to Schwinn is totally inapporpriate. If you were to however compare the off-topic situation in the 1990's you would be somewhat more correct, as Koga did take over majority control and production shifted away from Miyata's Japanese production.
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Steven Maasland
Moorestown, NJ, USA