TOKYO - Daiwa Can Co. announced the launch of DS Containers Inc., a Batavia, Ill.-based company that will initially manufacture aerosol cans. William J. Smith, founder and CEO of U.S. Can Co. until his retirement in 1998, was named chairman of DS Containers. Production is expected to begin in the second quarter of 2005 at a new, 236,000-square-foot plant in Batavia, employing proprietary Daiwa technology. The company has established technical agreements with packaging companies in the United States for a number of years, but DS Containers will be Daiwa's first manufacturing operation in North America.