Kunio Nakamura, dead at 83, transformed Panasonic as president

OSAKA -- Shortly after taking over as Panasonic president in 2000, Kunio Nakamura -- who died of pneumonia on Monday at age 83 in an Osaka hospital -- was called into the office of then-Toyota Motor Chairman Shoichiro Toyoda.

Back then, Panasonic still went by the corporate name Matsushita Electric Industrial and was in dire straits following the dot-com bubble burst.