The deal, Hitachi’s largest-ever overseas acquisition, was accepted by Bradken’s board. It follows a similar move by fellow Japanese manufacturer of mining equipment Komatsu (TYO: 6301), which decided in July to buy US-based competitor Joy Global (NYSE:JOY) in a transaction valued at $3.7 billion.

Hitachi has offered A$3.25 per share to buy the Aussie equipment supplier, it said in a note posted in its website, a 34% premium over Bradken’s closing share price on Friday.

By purchasing Bradken, Hitachi Construction Machinery aims to supplement its parts business for mining equipment and boost earnings.

Last year, Bradken rebuffed a A$428 million offer from Koch Industries Inc. and Pacific Equity Partners, because the firm believed it didn’t reflect a fair value.

The acquisition is the latest takeover in a string of outbound M&A deals by Japanese companies encouraged by a strong yen.

In an interview with Bloomberg, Xu Shaoshi, chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, said reducing overcapacity in the steel sector is also likely to surpass the nation’s annual goal.

By the end of August this year, coal production had fallen to 2.17 billion tons, down 10.2% from the same period in 2015. What’s more, according to the officer, China has begun importing more coal.

Soaring coal prices, particularly the steel-making kind, have made the task more challenging. However, Beijing is forging ahead with its plans to shut more than 1,000 coal mines by the end of the year. It is also keeping its decision to not approve any new coal mines until at least 2019, and — most recently — China’s government limited coal mines to operating a maximum 276 days annually.

Over the next three to five years, the goal is to reduce total output to 500 million tons.

“The coal industry is being dismantled faster than demand is decreasing, which has led to the price of coal rising by 40% this year,” Frank Sieren, who has lived in China for over 20 years,” writes Frank Sieren for Deutsche Welle, Germany’s international broadcaster.

“Since February, there is a gap in production of 60 million tons based on the average monthly consumption of the past four years,” he notes.

Conversely, China is boosting its renewables sector. According to the UN's annual environment report, Beijing invested a total of $103 billion or 36% of the world total on renewable energy last year.

The country also has 26 nuclear reactors currently under construction, another 40 in the planning stage and more than 100 being proposed which would require a five-fold increase in the country's uranium requirements.

"They are appealing to people's nurturing instincts."
However, Prof Dautenhahn, said it was "offensive" to believe it could be a child substitute for women without children, as some reportshave suggested.
Some of Toyota's marketing material shows women cradling the robot, but the company does not not explicitly make this claim.
"It might make people feel good, but there is no human component here, robots cannot be substitutes for children," said Prof Dautenhahn.
'Casual conversation'
Toyota says Kirobo Mini can:
engage in "casual conversation", using gestures, facial expressions and blinking
remember user preferences and previous events, such as likes, dislikes and outings
use data from connected devices such as those in the home or car to generate comments
It has a provisional price tag of 39,800 yen (£300), and there are no plans to sell it outside of Japan.
It is considerably cheaper than other companion robots - Aldebaran's humanoid robot, Pepper, cost 198,000 yen at launch.
Kirobo Mini's predecessor, a 34cm robot called Kirobo, was sent up to the International Space Station in 2013.
Its job was to accompany Japanese astronaut Kochi Wakata as part of a study about isolation.