Japan Inc. articles from March 2003

Japan Inc. archives from March 2003

From the editor.(summary of contents)
March 1, 2003... BOB SAPP, LIKE MEL Ott, has a name made for crossword puzzles. But the 171-kilogram former football player isn't the type to spend his Sundays thinking of a four letter word for "nothing, in Nantes"; he'd rather punch you in the face. Sapp is...

Sony tries to revive troubled Aiwa brand.(The pulse: the word on the street from the heart of Tokyo)
March 1, 2003... YESTERDAY'S ENEMY IS TODAY'S friend, according to an old proverb. But you are never sure who that friend may be until he shows up on your doorstep. Sony's Masaru Hirauchi had never dreamed of becoming the head of his long-time competitor, Aiwa....

China surpasses Japan as PC market.(The pulse: the word on the street from the heart of Tokyo)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... ... IN BRIEF: China was the world's second biggest market for personal computers in the last half of 2002, according to International Data Corp. China jumped ahead of Japan, which held the No. 2 spot behind the US for the first half of last...

Secom, Chiba police use GPS technology to nail stalkers.(use of Global Positioning Systems)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... The Chiba prefectural police have begun using a system developed by Secom that allows the victims of stalkers to press a button on their PDA or cellphone when they feel they are being stalked. The police would then be notified via GPS...

Breaks to go to investment funds.(The pulse: the word on the street from the heart of Tokyo)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... ... IN BRIEF The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) is set to extend preferential tax and regulatory treatment to investment funds pouring money into corporate reconstruction, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported. Plans call for...

Riding through the Tokyo streets in style.(The pulse: the word on the street from the heart of Tokyo)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Getting around in Tokyo can be a hassle, especially when you have to change subways so many times, and you don't want to pay [yen] 3,000 or so for even a short taxi ride. That's why we recommend two types of alternative transportation to spice...

Booming IP telephony challenges NTT's telecom empire.(Nippon Telegraph and Telephone's competition)
March 1, 2003... Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT Group has held a de facto monopoly in the fixed phone business for the past 100 years. Despite the keitai boom, as well as the coming of the broadband age, the Japanese still need NTT's connections for their...

Seagrand CardRec RM-300M.(credit-card sized portable audio player)(Brief Article)(Product/Service Evaluation)
March 1, 2003... Now the market for portable audio players is getting kind of fat with so many different machines out there and not much to differentiate between them. Success, Seagrand reckons, comes from doing things a little differently in order to make a...

Samsung's mighty big TV.(The pulse 2: the best of J@pan Inc's newsletters)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... The Japanese aren't renowned for boasting about the physical dimensions of the gadgetry they produce--small is usually better--but, in this case, Samsung Japan (OK, so they're really Korean) wants everyone to know they've done well. Their new...

Creative NOMAD Jukebox Zen 40GB (CNJBZ40F).(Portable audio player)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Creative, one of the foremost producers of portable audio players, has released two new models of its "Nomad Jukebox Zen" player. The 40GB version, the CNJBZ40F, has both USB and Firewire sockets and, thanks to that huge capacity, can store and...

Thomson's portable wizardry RCA Lyra RD2780.(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... The RD2780 combines an audio player with a video player and funky screen, making it the ultimate in portable entertainment machines. Possibly. With a two-and-a-half inch, 20-gig hard disk and a 3.5-inch TFT LCD screen, the "RCA Lyra Audio Video...

Wider wireless LAN access expected.(Wireless Local Area Network)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... ... IN BRIEF: The Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications intends to encourage the growth of WLAN hotspots. Legislation to amend the Telecommunications Business Law is to be put before the Diet, ministry...

Sony Digital Camcorders DCR-DVD100/200/300.(The pulse 2: the best of J@pan Inc's newsletters)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... It's hard to be patient when you're a total gadget freak, but if you can manage it, you reap the dividends. Sony has just released information on a widget that, at long last, makes me want to update my own digital camcorder--this one records to...

Mobile devices enter thinness battle.(The pulse 2: the best of J@pan Inc's newsletters)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... ... IN BRIEF: In the field of digital cameras and cellphones, many thin-style devices came out in the fall and winter of 2002, and these models occupy the top ranks in the best-seller charts. The same tendency can be seen for the cellphone...

Sony begins sale of new copy-protected CDs.(The pulse 2: the best of J@pan Inc's newsletters)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Sony Music Entertainment announced in January that it has started sales of new CD singles that can only be copied once onto a user's computer. Using a new proprietary format called LabelGate, the CDs will direct the user to Sony's Web site for...

So much for conventional wisdom: why status quo arguments about Japan's economic weaknesses are mostly hot air.(Upfront)
March 1, 2003... WHEN AN ECONOMY GOES cold, conventional economic wisdom runs hot. One of the worst examples of this, and the darling insight of the regular Time and Newsweek beat-ups on the sad state of Japan Inc., claims that because official debt in Japan...

'Independence' that counts: MBOs are becoming a viable tool for Japanese firms to branch out from their foreign parents. Intuit (Japan)'s CEO shares his experience.(management buyouts)(Company Profile)
March 1, 2003... KOZO HIRAMATSU, PRESIDENT AND chief executive officer of Intuit (Japan), drives a BMW Z3 and rides a Harley Davidson, but he swears he couldn't have afforded to "buy" his own company from its parent if he hadn't partnered with a private equity...

Shopping on the small screen: girls Walker shows that young women are ready and willing to buy via keitai.(Company Profile)
March 1, 2003... JAPANESE ARE OPTING IN to small-screen mobile "mail-mags" on their keitai, and Tokyo-based Xavel is scrolling up the profits. The company's Girls Walker mobile Web site (http://gw.st/pct currently lists around 75,000 titles and 9.4 million...

Japan's fight clubs: local promoters preside over one of the few booms in Japanese business. But with one of them now dead, and another in prison, they are suddenly fighting to survive.
March 1, 2003... AN AIR OF URGENCY pulses through the Utsunomiya line en route to Saitama. Mobs of teenagers and 20-somethings clamor on at each stop, the girls swathed in fashionable neo-peasant paisleys and suede jackets, the boys dressed in darker tones with...

Dealing with the local technology recession.(Sponsored Section.)(Interview)
March 1, 2003... The Tokyo bilingual systems integration market has been hammered over the last 18 months by the global Tech Economy meltdown and the reduction of operations of many foreign firms operating in Japan. We talked to the Director of Sales and...

Does paradise need a parking lot? It takes 26 hours to get to Tokyo's farthest-flung suburbs, but if the travel and construction industries get their way, that could all change.(Ogasawaras Islands, Japan)
March 1, 2003... IT GETS TIRESOME HEARING how "unique" Japan is; how the tea ceremony or the practice of Zen, for example, are parts of a special whole found only in this archipelago. So much of that "whole," like the tea ceremony and Zen, actually has roots...

Searching for the bottom: what you need to know before you buy land in Japan.(Real Estate part1)(Industry Overview)
March 1, 2003... TOKYO REAL ESTATE PRICES have fallen for 11 straight years. Commercial land in the capital has dropped in value by almost 80 percent. That must mean that now is the time to buy, right? Not so fast. Tokyo is the largest commercial office...

Cash on the table: an expat's tale.(real estate industry in Japan)
March 1, 2003... A COUPLE OF SUMMERS hack, an American guy teaching university in Tokyo approached me at a party. "So, when you getting out?" I was a bit puzzled by the question and asked him what he meant. It turned out that he had wanted to say, "When are you...

Reflation and gold loom on the horizon: the equity bears and gold bugs may be moving in to stay in the new fiscal year.
March 1, 2003... DURING THE SECULAR BULL market in the US and similar bull markets in other developed nations jibe major exception being Japan/, bears and gold bugs were an endangered species, as were value investors. Following a monster rally that propelled...

Correction.(Correction Notice)
March 1, 2003... In Goodbye to the Glory Days (February 2003, page 8-9), the correct name of the analyst from Daiwa Institute of Research is Shiroh Sakamaki.

The story of J@pan-Inc.(Brief Article)
March 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.
March 1, 2003... I READ YOUR REVIEW of the new Sony MP3 player NW-MS70D (The Pulse 2, page 6, February 2003) and thought your GadgetWatch writer might find this interesting. Since I am looking at new MP3 players at the moment, I checked this out further and...

Blowfish.(various news briefs)
March 1, 2003... Now I lay me down to sleeper. Overnight sleeper trains, called shindaisha in Japanese, are still alive and running, Yomiuri Weekly magazine reports. Operated by the JR Group companies, they include the Hayahusa between Tokyo and Kumamoto, the...