DIC faced departure of Polychrome top managements right after the take over. Mr. Halpern, fearing his stake would not be marketable once take over is complete and the company is delisted, tendered his 20% share to TOB. Mr. Levy who was then president of Polychrome came out of film background and did not have enough experience to lead presensitized plate focused company. Thus two left the company and S. Kawamura turned to his friend J. Piot who was a salesman with the Aradin company with which S Kawamura built a relationship earlier. H. Iwata became North American Manager of DIC to assist him. J. Piot and Iwata visited an Arthur Andersen partner to ask his opinion, he told JP that the role of leading Polychrome would be difficult for him.
But S.Kawamura did not have alternative and Polychrome was run by J Piot. But as Arthur Andersen partner predicted Polychrome management was in disarray within one year. J Piot did not have graphic arts experience and did not try to learn the business either. The competition in the presensitized plate at that time was the competition in run length. Even thought Polychrome introduced high run length plates, there were many complaints from customers. Technical group would say customer education is insufficient, production would say that the poor quality of sensitizer resulted in high coating loss, sales would say production is not up to par, Thus everyone was blaming others. This type of situation happens in a typical American company without an able leader; just as also happened in Kohl and Madden Co. which DIC purchased earlier.
H Iwata proposed S Kawamura to remove J Piot. His answer was to send Iwata back to Japan and replace him with H Irie who was considered to be the most able manager within DIC then. S Kawamura must have had concern that if he dismissed his appointee his reputation would suffer and thus ended up not able to replace J Piot right away.