Governor of Louisiana Names Hitachi Data Systems Executive, Rod McCowan, to Lead the Louisiana Family Recovery Corps

Executive on loan as acting Chief Executive Officer to aid Hurricane Katrina relief effort

SANTA CLARA, Calif. – October 7, 2005 – Hitachi Data Systems, provider of Services Oriented Storage Solutions™ solutions and a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE: HIT), today announced the company's worldwide Senior Vice President of Human Resources will take a short assignment to support the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. This week the Governor of the State of Louisiana, Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, named Rod McCowan as Acting Chief Executive Officer of the newly created Louisiana Family Recovery Corps.

Rod McCowan, commented on his appointment: "I welcome the opportunity to help the relief effort and work on setting up the Louisiana Family Recovery Corps. There is an immediate need to coordinate the great work of the disparate state, local, federal, non-government and private sector organizations that are so valiantly responding to the needs of the hundreds and thousands of displaced residents. We will strive to make a significant positive impact early on."

Dave Roberson, President and Chief Operating Officer of Hitachi Data Systems, said: "We are very proud that Rod accepted this temporary position and wish him all the best for this challenging assignment. This is a huge undertaking and we know that with his expertise and leadership abilities he will make a real difference to the people who have been affected by the terrible events in Louisiana."

McCowan's previous private sector leadership experience includes Executive Vice President for human resources and corporate communications worldwide at Herman Miller, Inc., and then President of Herman Miller East Asia. In the public sector, in 1991, McCowan was a White House Fellow and served in the first Bush administration as special assistant to the Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Following this, he was an assistant secretary of education in the Clinton administration. His non-profit leadership roles include service on the boards of Episcopal Divinity School and the Terry Sanford Institute for Public Policy at Duke University.

Rod McCowan's immediate focus will be on the following:

• Put together a leadership team to design and develop the best organizational strategy and model to meet the needs of evacuees. This team will include Rasha Hashaneen, also from Hitachi Data Systems, who will guide the creation of the business plan and strategy framework for the group.
• Around 900 Humanitarian Services Corps members, many of whom are from the state of Louisiana, will be trained to support families compassionately and help transition them to more permanent housing.
• Creation of a centralized information center for the management of information and logistics.
• Establish a Senior Advisory Board to assist with various aspects of the start-up and ongoing management of the project and help generate new donated resources to fill gaps in direct services.

Hitachi Data Systems leverages global R&D resources to develop storage solutions built on industry-leading technology with the performance, availability and scalability to maximize customers' ROI and minimize their risk. By focusing on the customer's perspective as we apply the best hardware, software, and services from Hitachi and our partners, we uniquely satisfy our customers' business needs.

With approximately 2,900 employees, Hitachi Data Systems conducts business through direct and indirect channels in the public, government and private sectors in over 170 countries and regions. Its customers include more than 50 percent of Fortune 100 companies. For more information, please visit our Web site at http://www.hds.com.

Hitachi, Ltd., (NYSE: HIT), headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is a leading global electronics company with approximately 347,000 employees worldwide. Fiscal 2004 (ended March 31, 2005) consolidated sales totaled 9,027.0 billion yen ($84.4 billion). The company offers a wide range of systems, products and services in market sectors including information systems, electronic devices, power and industrial systems, consumer products, materials and financial services. For more information on Hitachi, please visit the company's Website at http://www.hitachi.com.

Blanc & Otus Public Relations
Quinn Daly
(415) 856-5152
qdaly@blancandotus.com

Blanc & Otus Public Relations
Wadooah Wali
(415) 856-5150
wwali@blancandotus.com

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