Rotai Company Profile

Once upon a massage chair...

As with all the best history stories, there is often a degree of variance regarding who gets the gold medal for the invention. It's often easy to determine the "iffy" versions from the more accurate ones. Still, with massage chair history, various patented versions dating back to 1927 through the 1930s that commercially probably never saw the light of day. All of these versions started life in the USA. The illustrations in the patent documents below make for a fascinating read for the technical aficionado!
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However, we will leave it to you, dear reader, to determine which one is the more accurate. We are happy to say that it is likely to be a bit of both, although there are certainly five or six years separating the two versions.

The Little Girl Version

It appears (and certainly makes for a more heart-wrenching story!) that the first robotic chair was dreamed up back in 1945 by Niichi Kawahara of Japan. After five years of experimentation, he came out with the first working model in 1950.

Niichi's youngest daughter, Kazumi, suffered severely from Myofascial pain syndrome in her shoulder muscles or, in layman's terms, "knotty" shoulders. Daily, Niichi and his wife used to massage their daughter's shoulders in a concerted effort to relieve her pain. They then had a "lightbulb moment" and created an automation that Kazumi could use herself when her parents were at work.

Kawahara was a factory manager specialising in sewing machine parts. His first model was inspired by the technology he had gained through his employment. It mattered not that the chair's design couldn't have been any more basic, vertical and somewhat uncomfortable without any cushioning, not least it was handmade of floorboards. His automation managed to home in on the exact trigger points causing Kazumi so much pain, and she was able, for the first time, to leave the house and play with friends.

Please check out this wonderfully old video of Kazumi speaking about her father's quest to ease her suffering and see the invention still in use today!

Bathhouses have been around since Roman times in one form or another, and they have been very popular for hundreds of years in Japan. During the early 1950s, the owner of a very popular Japanese bathhouse, Mr Tomoyuki Nakae, came across Niichi's invention and viewed it as what could turn out to be a very profitable addition to his income insofar that his clients often came to his bathhouse not just for steam treatments, but for massages. As he did not have enough masseuses to cope with the demand, Mr Nakae added these units in the bathhouse and allowed each bather a three-minute session.Nakae was also an amateur inventor and teamed up with Niichi to produce a more efficient version and even one that was coin-operated. These eventually found their way into hundreds of bathhouses all over the country.

ROTAI provides healthy life to global users by the power of science and technology. By keeping using energy-saving environmental protection materials, by means of advanced manufacturing industry and striving to be the contribution model of enterprises as the goal, ROTAI makes a contribution to the field of energy saving and environmental protection in China. So far ROTAI has passed ISO09007 Certificate of quality system, ISO13485 Certificate of quality system, ISO14001Environmental management system certification and ISO010012 Measurement management system certification. ROTAI products are certified by CE，CB，ETL，RoHS，PSE，FCC and so on.

As the pioneer brand of massage apparatus in China,ROTAI（“ROTAI” as its new Logo ） has a history of 20 years. Cooperated with Universities and colleges,together with his team of engineers, adopting the best of cutting edge technologies and improved on its products,ROTAI gained market acceptance and built up its untouchable lead in China’s health product industry.

On 1st November 2017，ROTAI succeeded in getting listed on A-share market(Stock abbreviation:ROTAI HEALTH, stock code:603579)

Patented Technology & Awards

Integrating research and development with production and sales,ROTAI has successfully applied for over 100 patents for utility models, designs and inventions. It is entitled as “Shanghai Famous Brand”, “Shanghai Science and Technology Little Giant”, “Shanghai Innovative Enterprise”, “High-tech Enterprise” and “Shanghai Enterprise Technology Center”, etc.

Certificates

Placing prime importance on the preservation of the environment, ROTAI adhere to the use of Eco-friendly materials. ROTAI has passed ISO9001, ISO13485 and ISO14001 Quality System Certificate,its products all conform with CE，CB，ETL，RoHS，PSE，FCC etc. Standard.

SCIENCE&TECHNOLOGY MAKES OUR LIVES HEALTHIER

Thanks to the unremitting effort that our R&D team has been making,ROTAI has succeeded in providing hundreds of millions of customers with extraordinary, high-quality, innovative lifestyle products.

The impact of Ground-breaking work has seen us become more engaged in the intelligent massage products,Hi-tech home furnishing and commercial sharing massage chairs, creating public value and helping advance society.

As the leading provider, ROTAI will continue to offer unparalleled life-changing benefits to our clients at our utmost sincerity. We strive to be the game-changer in innovation and excellence. So let us be your trusted partner because your success is our success.

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