Livermore, Calif.-basedTopcon Positioning Systems last week named Kai Umino the new director of TPS sales support. He will report to Mick Yamazaki, TPS chief operating officer.

Umino joined Topcon Corp. in 1995 and has spent the past seven years managing sales operations at Topcon South Asia in Singapore and the Topcon office in Dubai.

“Kai’s joining our organization as the director of sales support will add tremendous global experience to our internal sales organization as we continue to expand the global reach of TPS,” said Ray O’Connor, TPS president and CEO.

Umino will be responsible for domestic and international sales support groups for TPS. The group supports five business units — Survey, Construction, Precision Agriculture, Emerging Business and Telematics.

“The importance of the role of the sales support group increased as we moved to a business unit structure,” Yamazaki said. “This structuring has allowed TPS to take advantage of our strengths in each individual market, and the growth will only continue and provide new and added challenges and opportunities for sales support to positively represent TPS.”

Umino replaces John Fujita who will return to Topcon Corp. headquarters in Tokyo. Fujita has worked for Topcon for 12 years, first with Topcon America Corporation and then for the last seven years at TPS in Livermore.

“John headed up the sales support team and worked with almost all the departments at TPS, supporting a period of dramatic growth for the company,” Yamazaki said. “We appreciate John’s work at TPS and extend our continued support after he returns to Japan.”

Topcon Positioning Systems designs and manufactures precise positioning products and solutions for the global surveying, construction, agriculture, civil engineering, mapping and GIS, asset management and mobile control markets.