Butterfly Table Tennis Equipment
What you need to know...

Hikosuke Tamasu chose the brand name Butterfly because the butterfly was an image of peace and beauty throughout the world.

This was in stark contrast to the horrible experiences he'd witnessed during World War Two. In 1945 as a young soldier, he was only 2km away from Hiroshima when the atomic bomb was dropped on Japan.

In the decades that followed, he tried very hard to diplomatically maintain friendly relations with all the nations in the world as he built up his company.

Tamasu's philosophy was that every player was different and that every player had his strengths and weaknesses.

He therefore wanted to help players to emphasize their individuality.

After showing Butterfly products at the Japan Industrial Exhibition in Peking in 1953, many of the Chinese world stars, as well as the top European players, were playing with Butterfly equipment.

But his first success was in the early 1960s with the rubbers Allround D13 and Tempest D13.

In 1967, the Butterfly table tennis company launched their Sriver rubber ... one of the most popular rubbers of all-time ... and it's still used by many of the top players today.

(By the way, it's not called Shriver, as some people think!)

Sriver rubber brought the company international recognition and in the early 1970s, Tamasu Butterfly Europe was founded in Moers, Germany.

But even though this rubber has been so successful ... and used by many world champions ... they're still striving to improve it.

In fact, since 1983 Butterfly table tennis have had their own training and research center in Tokyo where highly qualified scientists co-operate with world class players and coaches to further develop their table tennis rubbers and blades.

Proof of their success so far is that, for many years, Butterfly rubbers and blades have been used by more than half of the participants at most World Championships and European Championships.

Although rubbers and blades are Butterfly's main products, they also supply a wide range of other high quality equipment such as tables, clothing, shoes and accessories.

Indeed, Butterfly's motto is ... Quality and service come first.

At the start, Hikosuke Tamasu was the Managing Director of the company, whilst his father was President. However, in the early 1990s he appointed his son Kimihiko to lead the company.

Subsequently, Hikosuke passed away in 2004 at the age of 83, having been born in Yanai, Japan on 20 August 1920.

Two years after his death, Kimihiko went through every article that his father had left and decided to donate the items that were most important to him, and the most valuable to the table tennis world, to the International Table Tennis Federation's Museum.

This included an extensive pin collection, books, early Butterfly magazines, a selection of Butterfly rackets together with some personal items including photographs.

Even the heavy Nikon camera, which always accompanied Hikosuke wherever he travelled, was donated.

The Butterfly table tennis company decided to focus on young players ... so they signed up some leading young European players, giving them long term contracts to promote Butterfly table tennis products.

Two of these players were Germany's Timo Boll and Denmark's Michael Maze.

Former world number one, Timo Boll remembers...

"At age 10 I had a contract with another brand, but they didn't want to extend it.

The reason given was that I had asked for 28 instead of 8 sheets of rubber.

Obviously this was too many for them and so Butterfly took over. This was the beginning of a super partnership."

Top international players who currently endorse Butterfly table tennis equipment include:

Men - FAN Zhendong (CHN), Tomokazu HARIMOTO (JPN), OVTCHAROV Dimitrij (GER), Timo BOLL (Germany), QIU Dang (GER), FRANZISKA Patrick (GER), LEE Sangsu (KOR), WONG Chun Ting (HKG), Jun Mizutani (JPN), Shunsuke Togami (JPN), LIN Yun-Ju (TPE), SHINOZUKA Hiroto (JPN), Zhang Jike (CHN), CHUANG Chih-Yuan (TPE), LIM Jonghoon (KOR), KALLBERG Anton (SWE), Kristian Carlson (SWE), Omar Assar (EGY), Yukiya Uda (JPN), GACINA Andrej (CRO), FREITAS Marcos (POR), FILUS Ruwen (GER), GERAS SIMENKO Kirill (KAZ), CHEN Szu-Yu (TPE), JHA Kanak (USA), GNANA SEKARAN Sathiyan (IND), GARDOS Robert (AUT), LIN Shidong (CHN), Groth Jonathan (DEN), YOSHIMURA Maharu (JPN), TSUBOI Gustavo (BRA), AFANADOR Brian (PUR), Aguirre Marcelo (PAR), APOLONIA Tiago (POR), Walther Ricardo (GER), MONTEIRO Joao (POR), MINO Alberto (ECU), Noshad ALAMIYAN (IRI), KUMAHARA Luca (BRA), JOUTI Eric (BRA), Ho Kwan-kit (HKG), LIAO Cheng-Ting (TPE), OIKAWA Mizuki (JPN), JAIN Payas (IND), ALAMIAN Nima (IRI), GIONIS Panagiotis (GRE), KONISHI Kaii (JPN), STEGER Bastian (GER), PARK Ganghyeon (KOR), YOSHIDA Masaki (JPN), MACHI Asuka (JPN), ARINOBU Taimu (JPN), UEDA Jin (JPN), Matsuyama Yuki (JPN), TSUBOI Yuma (JPN), SAMBE Kohei (JPN), KIM Donghyun (KOR), HUANG Yi-Hua (TPE), MATSUSHIMA Sora (JPN), SAKAI Asuka (JPN), MATSUSHITA Taisei (JPN), TAKAKIWA Taku (JPN), OYA Hidetoshi (JPN), KASAHARA Hiromitsu (JPN), Kreanga Kalinikos (GRE), FEGERL Stefan (AUT), SHIBAEV Alexander (RUS), OH Junsung (KOR), MATSUMOTO Cazuo (BRA), BURGOS Nicolas (CHI), Michael MAZE (Denmark).

Women - Adriana DIAZ (PUR), POLCANOVA Sofia (AUT), SAWETTABUT Suthasini (THA), CHENG I-Ching (TPE), SAMARA Elizabeth (ROU), MESHREF Dina (EGY), ZHANG Mo (CAN), LEE Hoching (HKG), HARIMOTO Miwa (JPN), KATO Miyu (JPN), MORI Sakura (JPN), PAVADE Prithika (FRA), SAWETTABUT Jinnipa (THA), LIU Jia (AUT), MONTEIRO DODEAN Daniela (ROU), SUZUKI Rika (JPN), TAKEYA Misuzu (JPN), KIMURA Kasumi (JPN), MATSUSHIMA Miku (JPN), ITO Yuan (JPN), PARK Gahyeon (KOR).

Want to know more about Butterfly TT equipment?

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• Butterfly rubbers and blades

• Butterfly tables

• Butterfly clothing

• Butterfly shoes

• Butterfly barriers and court accessories

• Butterfly accessories

Butterfly sponsored players

Discover what Butterfly equipment the best players use...

Men

• Fan Zhendong (China) - Blade: Fanzhendong ALC, Rubber: Dignics 09C
• Timo Boll (Germany) - Blade: Timo Boll ALC, Rubber: Dignics 09C
• Dimitrij Ovtcharov (Germany) - Blade: Ovtcharov Inner Force ALC, Rubber: Dignics 09C
• Tomokazu Harimoto (Japan) - Blade: Tomokazu Harimoto Inner Force ALC, Rubber: Dignics 05
• Shunsuke Togami (Japan) - Blade: Zhang Jike ALC, Rubber: Tenergy 05 Hard
• Panagiotis Gionis (Greece) - Blade: Corbel, Rubbers: Tenergy 05 Hard and Feint Long 2
• Lee Sangsu (South Korea) - Blade: Special order (Arylate carbon shake/inner fiber specification), Rubber: Dignics 09C
• Kanak Jha (USA) - Blade: Timo Boll ALC, Rubbers: Dignics 05 and Tenergy 19
• Eric JOUTI (Brazil) - Blade: Biscaria, Rubbers: Dignics 05

Women

• Adriana Diaz (PUR) - Blade: Biscaria SUPER ALC, Rubber: Dignics 05
• Cheng I-Ching (Chinese Taipei) - Blade: Special order (Super ZL carbon shake/inner fiber specification), Rubber: Dignics 09C
• Sofia Polcanova (AUT) - Blade: Inner Force Layer ZLC, Rubbers: Dignics 05 and Tenergy 64
• Suthasini Sawettabut (THA) - Blade: Biscaria SUPER ALC, Rubbers: Dignics 05 and Tenergy 05
• Elizabeth Samara (ROU) - Blade: Jun Mizutani SUPER ZLC, Rubber: Tenergy 05
• Dina Meshref (EGY) - Blade: Timo Boll ALC, Rubbers: Dignics 09C and Tenergy 05
• Zhang Mo (CAN) - Blade: Special order (arylate carbon shake), Rubbers: Impartial XB and Dignics 05
• Lee Hoching (HKG) - Blade: Tomokazu Harimoto Inner Force ZLC, Rubber: Dignics 05
• Dodean-Monteiro, Daniela (Romania) - Blade: Special order (carbon shake), Rubber: Tenergy 05

Butterfly sponsored clubs

• Borussia Dusseldorf (Germany)
• Roskilde (Denmark)
• TTC Neuulm (Germany)

Butterfly sponsored national teams

• Germany
• Chinese Taipei
• South Korea
• Portugal
• USA
• England
• Denmark
• Puerto Rico
• Mexico
• Wales
• Scotland
• China

Butterfly sponsored coaches

• KURASHIMA Yosuke (JPN)
• KISHIDA Satoko (JPN)
• QIU Jianxin (GER)
• FUJII Hiroko (JPN)
• YAJIMA Yoshio (JPN)
• HANEYOSHI Junko (JPN)
• YOKOYAMA Yuichi (JPN)
• MITAMURA Muneaki (JPN)
• ANDO Masakatsu (JPN)