The Namiki Manufacturing Company was founded in 1918 by Japanese professor, Ryosuke Namiki and Masao Wada. Namiki left his job in 1915 and founded a small factory near Tokyo to produce gold pen nibs. A year later Namiki expanded his product line to offer fountain pens and his company became a fully-fledged manufacturer of writing instruments. In 1926 the partnership established offices in Malaysia, Singapore, Boston, London and Shanghai and in 1938 the company was renamed The Pilot Pen Company. Always an innovator, Pilot introduced it's famous Capless fountain pen in 1964. The Capless was re-introduced as the Vanishing Point in 1972.