110,000 shares of Nippon Sheet Glass owned by Sumitomo Company and the family members were disposed by the government commission for liquidating the zaibatsu holding companies to promote more democratic management and ownership of corporations. Because of a government directive to preferentially sell these shares to employees, most of the shares were acquired by directors and employees.
Due to government restrictions on the Company’s ownership of securities, additional shares were disposed and the executives in the affiliated companies were forced to resign. As a result of these actions, the number of shareholders increased five-fold to 2,556 by June 1949.