Japan Inc. articles from April 2003

Japan Inc. archives from April 2003

From the editor.(report on Japanese economy)(Editorial)
April 1, 2003... WHAT TO MAKE OF modern Japan? Within the span of several days this winter, I read two reports on Japan that couldn't be more completely at odds with each other. One, "The Irrelevance of Japan," by Nikko Salomon Smith Barney analyst Alexander...

The story of J@pan-Inc.("Japan Incorporated", magazine)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... The term 'Japan Incorporated' was first used in a 1936 Fortune magazine article that said: "The industrial hierarchy of Japan is so compact that you can almost think of its works as the products of a single beautifully integrated and highly...

To the editor.(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2003... We received this letter from the author of A Japanese Visa Handbook in response to a column by our publisher, Terrie Lloyd, on WorkinJapan.com. Lloyd called the book "a handy little tome," and complimented the author on her "excellent effort at...

Is Japan a promised land for Korean Java engineers? (The Pulse).
April 1, 2003... MORE JAVA-SAVVY KOREAN ENGINEERS are viewing Japan as a place for future employment. It all started in 2000, when former prime minister Yoshiro Mori and former South Korean president Kim Dae-jung agreed on a basic framework for the South...

ADSL price war hits new low: providers offer connections for free. (The Pulse).
April 1, 2003... ... IN BRIEF: NTT Communications is offering three months of free ADSL connections for OCN subscribers who sign up by the end of April. Also, NTT East is offering two months of free Flet's ADSL connections through September. These NTT group...

Sotec teams with PC Depot to offer "Japan's cheapest" PCs. (The Pulse).(Sotec Company Ltd.)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... ... IN BRIEF: Computer maker Sotec and major PC chain PC Depot formed a business alliance to develop a joint brand, Valueup, which they claim will be Japan's cheapest PC. The Valueup series, consisting of three types, is priced between [yen]49,...

New International School breaks from mold. (The Pulse).
April 1, 2003... PETE JUDS AND MARIKO Maeda, a husband-and-wife team, have run two of the best little international preschools in Tokyo for about a decade. Juds runs the Sunshine Montessori School in Minami Azabu and Maeda runs Little People Montessori School...

Boozing Japan - government to deregulate licensing. (The Pulse).
April 1, 2003... JAPAN IS ONE OF the few countries where you can buy booze 24 hours a day - and it is about to become boozier. Many non-alcohol retailers are entering the market, anticipating the deregulation of population quotas for liquor licensing in...

Sony's wireless server FSV-PGX1. (The Pulse 2).(from Sony Corp.)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... You'll be tempted to tuck the FSV-PGXl into your coat pocket as you leave the office, since it looks a lot like a PDA or Pocket PC, but if you do, you may well stuff up your boss' plans for an evening of high level meetings with the lawyers....

Olympus [micro]-20 digital. (The Pulse 2).(from Olympus Corp. (Japan))(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... The [micro]-20 is the latest little creation out of the Olympus Camera labs and is touted as the "world's first metal-bodied waterproof digital camera in the [micro] (pronounced myu) series." Can't argue with that, I guess. According to...

Development of non-karaoke mobile music is slow but under wag. (The Pulse 2).
April 1, 2003... We all know that karaoke applications are big in Japan, but what about nonkaraoke mobile music software? The first thing we noticed about non-karaoke music software for the 504i handsets is that there is relatively little of it. While many...

Matsushita's DVD recorder "DIGA" series. (The Pulse 2).(Matsushita Electric Corporation of America )(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Matsushita announces a whole bunch of new DVD recorders, and the entire Western world is left reeling in shock and disbelief. Not really, but it sounds more dramatic that way. But the company has managed a simultaneous worldwide release for two...

am3 adapter for GBA SP. (The Pulse 2).(from Nintendo Company Ltd.)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... In anticipation of Nintendo's addition to its Game Boy franchise GBA SP (the SP bit stands for "Same as Previous"... .), am3 has produced an "am3 Smart Media" memory card for use in the new, only very slightly improved Game Boy Advance. Owners...

Sharp LCD panel LL-T19D1-H. (The Pulse 2).(from Sharp Corp. (Japan))(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... The LL-T19D1-H is -- there's a clue in the name if you look hard enough - a 19-inch LCD display panel with a super high contrast ratio of 700:1 from Sharp. Producing an SXGA (that's 1,280 x 1,024 dots, fact fans!) display, the unit is only 22.5...

All aboard! Next stop: digital print station; self-service photo vending is making it easier than ever to print digital photos via a wide range of electronic media. (Upfront).
April 1, 2003... NEXT-GENERATION DIGITAL PHOTO vending machines, or "print stations," from Omron, NEC and Fuji Film all premiered in the Japanese market in late fall 2002, and they've been proliferating ever since. These machines juggle memory sticks, compact...

Birthday 'bot: Japan's most famous superhero is back in a big way. (Upfront).
April 1, 2003... TETSUWAN ATOM - BOY ROBOT. Super powered and super shiny, Atom (Astro Boy in the West) zoomed across Japanese television screens in briefs and boots back in the black-and-white 1960s, battling aliens and monsters. A kindhearted little guy just...

Blast from the past: is that a ghost in your pocket or are you just tuned in to chakugoe? (Upfront).
April 1, 2003... LEONARDO DA VINCI IS said to have been so enamored of his portrait Mona Lisa that he carried it everywhere with him on his travels. Five hundred years after it was painted, the Florentine lady's silent, enigmatic face continues to mesmerize --...

Plenty of Japanese-language domain names may be up for grabs this spring. (Upfront).
April 1, 2003... [CHINESE CHARACTER NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII].com IF YOU MISSED OUT on getting a Japanese language domain name back in 2000, your second chance may be coming up. VeriSigu of the US announced at the beginning of this year that its...

Make deals: buyouts claw their way through a crowded marketplace. (Bayouts).
April 1, 2003... Part 1 SELLING ONE'S OWN CORPORATION used to be considered an act of betrayal in Japan. But more Japanese corporations, big and small alike, are accepting this approach to survival as they look into opportunities to sell their non-core...

Small but steady: Advantage Partners cofounder Richard Folsom talks with J@pan Inc's Sumie Kawakami about the buyout business in Japan. (Buyouts).
April 1, 2003... Part 2 WHO SAYS THERE AREN'T enough buyout deals in Japan? It may all be a matter of perspective. Richard Folsom says his firm, Advantage Partners, sees at least 150 opportunities a year. "Our view is that there is actually very steady...

Buzzing on brands: never has image made so much difference in business. From logos and corporate identity to consumer trust and perceived value, the buzzword is "brand". (Special Advertising Section; Advertising, PR and Branding).
April 1, 2003... IN TODAY'S CORPORATE WORLD there is surely nothing as incorporeal and yet so crucial as a company's brand. Difficult to quantify but now acknowledged as a key determiner of a corporation's profitability, brands and branding have gravitated to...

Directory listing--advertising, PR and branding. (Special Advertising Section: Advertising, PR and Branding).
April 1, 2003... Bates Yomiko Inc Shibaura Square Building, 16F, 4-9-25 Shibaura, Minato-ku Tokyo, 108-0023 Japan Tel +81-3-3455-5775 Memo Fax +81-3-3453-7915 URL http://www.batesyomiko.com Contact person(s) David Meredith...

Japan's hippest export.
April 1, 2003... IT WAS ALL GO at the Art Basel Miami Beach in December. Art lovers swooned over exhibits produced by artists from all over the world. But amidst the flurry of activity during the weeklong show, it was the work of Japanese artist Momoyo...

The power of Tokyo street style: FRUiTS magazine brings Japan fashion rebels to the world.
April 1, 2003... IN THE CONSUMER-DAZED WORLD of Tokyo, a group of teens are battling the wave of change taking place in Japanese subculture. They are the FRUiTS kids of Harajuku, whose cutting-edge street fashion caused a cultural revolution, inspiring a new...

Recruiting. (Special Advertising Section: Executive Search 2003).
April 1, 2003... AMID A WORSENING ECONOMIC recession, rising unemployment and failed economic reforms, Japan's recruitment and human resources industry is still finding ways to exploit the world's second biggest economy. A continuing downturn in the Japanese...

Directory listing--executive search 2003. (Special Advertising Section: Executive Search 2003).
April 1, 2003... A.C.E. International Ltd 1-11-12 Toranomon 2F, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 105-0001 Japan Tel +81-3-3503-2251 Fax +81-3-3503-2254 URL http://www.aceplacements.com Contact person(s) Krishna Mahalingam Email...

In defense of the realm.
April 1, 2003... JAPAN'S MILITARY ESTABLISHMENT FACES an uncertain future. Can it really defend the archipelago, handle a "hot" crisis in the region or play a role in containing North Korea? Michael E. Stanley cuts through the "fog of war" and provides a...

Hotels change with the times. (Special Advertising Section: Hotels and Travel).
April 1, 2003... Japan's rapidly changing hotel industry is gearing up for an influex of business and leisure travelers. Providing luxury amenities and an expanding array of services, cutting edge hotels now cater to the individual's every need and desire ...

Directory listing--hotels and travel. (Special Advertising Section: Hotels and Travel).
April 1, 2003... The Pan Pacific Hotel Yokohama 2-3-7 Minato Mirai Nishi-ku, Yokohama 220-8543 Japan Tel +81-45-682-2222 Fax +81-45-682-2223 URL http://pphy.co.jp Contact person(s) Mr. Shige Akimoto Email akimoto@pphy.co.jp...

The debate over corporate governance: a special section for professional investors focused on Japan. (Investor Insight).
April 1, 2003... The top-down debate rages on about just what the government and the Bank of Japan can do to revitalize Japan's economy, eradicate deflation and liquidate the growing mountain of nonperforming loans. But the Nikkei 225 continues to shrink to...

The hit parade. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... According to Infoseek, the most popular key words entered in the Internet search engine between November 2001 and October 2002 were "World Cup." These were followed in descending order by words related to typhoon information, Hikaru Utada (a...

Shop from home. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... At the start of the New Year, the Asahi Shimbun's Tsuhan Seikatsu magazine produced a special edition listing the nation's top 100 mail order items. The top products listed (with country of origin for products made outside Japan) were as...

Battle of the broadbands. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... The Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications reported that 5,645,700 people connected to the Internet via digital subscriber lines (primarily the ADSL variety) during 2002 -- a 3.7-fold increase from a year...

Doing it all over again. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... A survey by Jean D. Aiwai of 300 housewives asked them to name the things in life they would want to do differently if given the chance -- like choosing their hubby. The first item, however, was not a new spouse, but education or training,...

The future of shopping. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... How will you buy your veggies in 2005? The Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living asked 420 adults in the greater Tokyo area. At present, all of them said they just go to the store and carry them home. But in three years' time, 13.7 percent of...

Slicing up the pie. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... In 2002, Sony, Fujitsu and NEC continued to dominate domestic desktop computer sales during the end of October through the mid-December year-end sales rush. And because Fujitsu's share was up sharply -- mostly at Sony's expense -- the figures...

OL lives after five. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... What do "office ladies" really do after work? Keiko and Manabu, a magazine that appeals to people seeking adult education for self improvement, and the OL Research Institute, teamed up to ask 115 office ladies around Japan what they do "after...

Can't get no satisfaction. (Blowfish).
April 1, 2003... A survey by women's apparel manufacturer Wacoal compared female body proportions around the world, and the results were revealing indeed. Among five major cities, the tallest females in the 20-40 age group were found in Paris, where they...