After making his decision to establish an office together with several workers from Kunitomo Seisakusho, Issey visited Dr. Inokuty on the night of the bankruptcy and asked to be allowed to take over his pump work. Dr. Inokuty promised that he would give his full support, but since Issey did not have enough money to independently maintain a plant, he planned to only be responsible for design and sales, and for production to be outsourced. Issey immediately rented the second floor of an industrial magazine company in Ginza (Higashinabe-cho, Kyobashi-ku, Tokyo) and established the Inokuty Type Machinery Office, the predecessor of EBARA Corporation, with Dr. Inokuty as Senior Manager and Issey as Manager.
Issey was 30 years old at the time. Since Dr. Inokuty’s current occupation was as a university professor, he could not become a representative of a commercial company and assumed the title of Senior Manager. Even after the company became EBARA Corporation, however, Dr. Inokuty took on the position of Advisor with Issey as Senior Managing Director, and Issey did not adopt the role of President while Dr. Inokuty was in life.

With no plants or funds, the office had no choice but to rely on its ingenuity and intelligence to sell its technology. In addition to creating designs for orders, it carried out research based on Dr. Inokuty’s theories, and dedicated itself to producing high-quality pumps even if they were in small quantities. As a result, its products gained recognition in the industry and orders for them gradually increased. In the third year since the establishment of the office, it was finally able to own its first self-funded plant in Nippori, Tokyo. When it was first established, it was a small local workshop with about 20 employees. The office did not have enough money to install the mechanical equipment that had been arranged. All it could equip itself with were nine small machines with no cranes or assembly plants. Since it could not carry out the full range of processes from mechanical processing to assembly of large pumps, machining was performed to the extent possible at the plant and the pumps were then taken to work sites where all assembly and testing procedures were performed. In addition, the plant had a dirt floor and the building leaked severely. During heavy rains, the floor quickly turned into mud. Despite these difficult business environments, Issey overcame them with his passion and sense of ingenuity toward work. Notable pumps that were ordered, designed, and manufactured at that time included centrifugal pumps with a diameter of 760 mm ordered in 1915 and installed at the Mikawashima Sewage Treatment Plant, and centrifugal pumps with a diameter of 1,140 mm ordered in 1916 and installed at the Asakusa Tamachi Drainage Pump Station.
The pumps at Asakusa Tamachi were in active use for more than 40 years until they were removed in 1963, and one of the removed pumps is even now set up in the entrance lobby of EBARA Corporation’s head office.
Regarding the management of the plant, Issey stated that in that period it was commonplace for local workshops to use an apprenticeship system centered around a master, but he eliminated that system and adopted a thorough technology-first policy, so his employees were able to devote themselves single-mindedly to pump design and production.