Japanese semiconductor firms are well known for obtaining dynamics in a short period of time and achieving even global leadership. A significant portion of their success are attributable to cooperative interfirm relations and the development of intermediate organizational structure based on long-term relationship between firms. The purpose of this book is to explain how interfirm relations contributed to their dynamics during the golden age of the semiconductor industry. Meanwhile this book clarifies the real source of dynamics in interfirm relations and how the firms have interacted. The author concludes that the competitive-cum-cooperative (CCC) interfirm interaction are observed. Quantitative and qualitative findings show that firms enjoy not only flexible cooperation based synergy effects, but also dynamics market-like effects by creating competition among partners through CCC interaction.

How did Japanese companies, technology-supporting organizations, and governments reformulate organizational strategies, industrial structures, and institutions to revive Japanese high-tech industries (semiconductor, telecommunications, and biotechnology) in the 1990s? This book takes a comprehensive look at the question by integrating the fields of institutional economics and corporate strategy, an approach that will be of significant interest theoretically and empirically to scholars, professionals, and graduate students. Complex interactions among diverse technology-related actors are presented, focusing on co-evolution among market changes induced by technology innovation, macro-level institutional arrangements for innovation, and corporate strategies for survival. Insights are provided on diverse types of institutional arrangements, technology innovation policies, and management practices for companies and technology organizations.

Institutional Interconnections and Cross-Boundary Cooperation in Inclusive Business explores the nature and characteristics of institutional interconnections in inclusive business and how these connections can be developed to help alleviate poverty through business activities in developing countries.

The Japanese economy has made a remarkable recovery from the so-called ‘Lost Decade’ of the 1990s. This said, demographic trends suggest that Japan will have to show remarkable powers of innovation if it is to continue to prosper in the global economy. For, around the turn of the last century texts published by prominent strategy analysts such as Michael Porter and colleagues were asking whether Japan could continue to compete at all, and in answering this question they not only gained significant global attention, they also appeared to sound the death knell for strategic innovation in Japan. This collection helps put the record straight. It invites authors and editors of previous (Routledge) titles on the topic of ‘Innovation in Japan’ to reflect on how things have moved on – prominent scholars on Japanese innovation such as Martin Hemmert, Cornelia Storz, and Ruth Taplin, all of whom appear in this collection. It brings together fresh perspectives on Japanese-style innovation, from insiders and from outsiders, from scholars and from practitioners, all of whose combined contributions to this book update our understanding of how patterns of innovation in Japan are evolving and thus provide inspiration and guidance for managers and innovators worldwide.

One of the most striking phenomena of China’s remarkable economic growth is that its huge volume of exports are becoming high-tech. China is now the world's largest Information and Communication Technology (ICT) exporter, having overtaken Japan and the European Union in 2003 and the United States in 2004. China's ICT industry is also the largest manufacturing sector within the Chinese economy. This book examines how China has attained this leading position and presents one of the first accounts of China’s ICT development model with specific reference to the experiences of East Asian 'tigers'. It shows how the development of the industry was military-driven before 1978, and how subsequently Chinese policymakers, struggling with domestic market reform and challenged by trade liberalisation and globalisation, managed to push through ICT development strategies. Overall, it discusses the debates between policymakers as to the most appropriate economic development strategy for 'catching-up' and demonstrates how China moved away from the across-the-board protectionist and interventionist industrial policies pursued by many developing countries, but has not wholeheartedly followed the neo-liberal free trade and market polices favoured by the World Bank, WTO and IMF. By doing so, it sheds light on the limitations of China’s strategies moving forward, and identifies policy lessons for other developing countries.

The goal of this path-breaking volume is to relativize the experience of Japanese industries in terms of both location and time, exploring its similarities and differences with other countries and its unique relationship with the global standard of company performance set by US firms. Yongdo Kim looks beyond organizational principles, overturns stereotypes, and covers a wide range of industries. In particular, this book focuses on the intertwining of the market principle and the organizational principle in interfirm relationships among the steel, machine tool, integrated circuit and liquid-crystal display materials industries, concluding that there is no such thing as ‘Japanese uniqueness’ in the history of interfirm relationships. This book compares several intermediate product industries within a global context to offer insights into the studies of businesses across the globe. Numerous interviews with key individuals in the Japanese steel, integrated circuit and machine tool industries offer unique and illuminating information. This analysis covers a broad range of firms by examining the relationships within large companies as well as smaller corporations. This fresh and varied analysis is a critical resource for both business practitioners and scholars of business history, business strategy, industrial marketing, product development management, and economic history.

With Strategic Networks: The Art of Japanese Interfirm Cooperation, you will examine the structure and dynamics of Japanese business networks and discover successful Japanese business practices and opportunities. For professors of business and Japanese studies, as well as managers of firms throughout the world, this book analyzes new and innovative networks through case examples from the Japanese automobile, chemical, and electronics industries. Strategic Networks offers you insight into the management of these company partnerships and how they work to increase the competitiveness of businesses and allow firms within the network to share important knowledge. Unknown to many, several of the management concepts that made Japanese companies successful in the 1980s, such as total quality control (TQC) and continuing improvement processes (CIP), were only a part of the formula for a successful business. This book discusses types of Japanese strategic networks, another element of Japan’s thriving business structure of today, how they are influenced by Japanese cultural values and state interventions, and why all of the businesses involved are benefiting from these networks. Evaluating the theoretical foundation of these business relationships and intercompany cooperation, Strategic Networks offers you up-to-date information on the structures of Japanese firms by: examining Karl Popper’s ideas on critical rationalism and how Japanese companies follow his theories of problem solving, questioning, and developing knowledge explaining the system, growth, and game theories in order to completely understand a network and all of its facets exploring the ability to work with and navigate strategic networks when they are managed without strict plans or with unforeseen circumstances recognizing how networks enable the activation of interpreneurs to develop future visions, innovations, and responsible leadership for the network Complete with illustrations to emphasize important points along with insight into networks in the twenty-first century, Strategic Networks offers information and research that will help you understand how Japanese networks operate and how Japanese firms are conducting business differently. As a result, you will learn how the changing values in Japanese society influence company structures and procedures and come to understand the unique workings and effective structures of strategic networks.