was an engineer formerly employed at a Japanese Ministry of Industry (''Kōbushō'') factory. In 1877, only a year after

Alexander Graham Bell Alexander Graham Bell (, born Alexander Bell; March 3, 1847 – August 2, 1922) was a Scottish-born inventor, scientist and engineer who is credited with patenting the first practical telephone. He also co-founded the American Telephone and T ...

's invention, ''Kōbushō'' had started an effort to make telephone receivers by reverse engineering and Oki was in the team that came up with the first prototype. In January 1881, convinced that the nation was about to enter the age of communications, Oki founded Meikōsha, which was later renamed

Oki Electric Industry , commonly referred to as OKI, OKI Electric or the OKI Group, is a Japanese information and communications technology company, headquartered in Toranomon, Minato-ku, Tokyo and operating in over 120 countries around the world. OKI produced the ...

. The company manufactured the first telephones in Japan in 1881, only five years after the device was invented by Bell.

References

1848 births 1906 deaths University of Tokyo alumni Japanese businesspeople People of Meiji-period Japan {{Japan-business-bio-stub