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BUSINESS
May 23, 2000

Need for reform cited by business

Accelerating regulatory reforms and reducing telecommunications costs are necessary to better utilize information technology, a gathering of business leaders told the government Monday.
JAPAN
May 23, 2000

Sydney Olympics tours ready to wreak havoc on wallets

With the Sydney Olympics now less than four months away, many travel agents in Japan are busy selling tour packages to the Games.
BUSINESS
May 22, 2000

As with risk, ranks of analysts rising

Once again the time has come for the mass-release of Japan Inc.'s annual earnings reports. While the stock market is showing signs of rumbling back to life after nearly a decade of dormancy, significant changes to Japan's financial landscape are forcing players to make rapid transitions just to keep...
BUSINESS
May 20, 2000

End to deflation fears nearing, BOJ chief says

Bank of Japan Gov. Masaru Hayami said Friday that an end to deflationary fears is nearing -- which may mean an end to the zero-interest rate policy -- amid a brightening picture for the Japanese economy.
BUSINESS
May 20, 2000

Fast Internet server delays launch

SpeedNet Inc., which surprised the nation's telecom industry last year by trumpeting a much cheaper and faster wireless Internet service than other companies' offerings, announced Friday that it will postpone the service's launch, originally scheduled for this summer.
BUSINESS
May 20, 2000

SpeedNet boss to take blame

The board of directors at SpeedNet Inc. was expected to endorse the resignation of President Yutaka Shinto at its extraordinary meeting Friday, company sources said.
BUSINESS
May 17, 2000

Stores' sales fall 0.6% in April

Sales at department stores in Tokyo's 23 wards totaled 172.6 billion yen in April, down 0.6 percent from a year earlier, for the second straight month of decline, the Japan Department Stores Association said in a preliminary report Tuesday.
BUSINESS
May 15, 2000

Manufacturers dying for new blood

Japan's manufacturers have a staunch ally in Tokai University Professor Hajime Karatsu.
JAPAN
May 12, 2000

Register your Web site -- in Japanese

Japanese characters can now be used in registering Internet site addresses, U.S. Web technology developer i-DNS.net International Inc. said Thursday.
SOCCER / J. League
May 11, 2000

Troussier report due today

An assessment report on Japan manager Philippe Troussier's performance will be submitted to Japan Football Association president Shunichiro Okano on Thursday morning, Kunishige Kamamoto, a vice president and chief of the JFA technical development department, said Wednesday.
COMMENTARY / World
May 11, 2000

Dubai: the Mideast's global village

DUBAI -- Last month, Gen. Sheikh Muhammad bin Maktum, minister of defense of the United Arab Emirates, announced at a press conference that the Internet revolution and the "new economy" were coming to the government of Dubai. It was an incongruous spectacle, so traditional a figure, in distinctive black...
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
May 10, 2000

Sea of love

Ponder, if you will, these two recent headlines:
BUSINESS
May 10, 2000

DoCoMo makes foray into European market

Fired by the ambition to spread its next-generation multimedia cellular systems across Europe, NTT DoCoMo Inc. said Tuesday that it will acquire 15 percent of Dutch-based cellular operator KPN Mobile N.V. for 500 billion yen.
BUSINESS
May 9, 2000

'Love Bug' virus swamps Japan's firms

More than 84,000 e-mail messages carrying the "Love Bug" computer virus had been detected as of Monday evening in Japan, leading antivirus software provider Trend Micro Inc. said.
JAPAN
May 7, 2000

Love Bug bites 30,000 Japan computers

An estimated 30,000 computers in Japan have received e-mail containing the "Love Bug" virus, a provider of antivirus computer software said Saturday.
BUSINESS
May 5, 2000

Bluetooth wants bite of mobile market

Portable computers' claim to fame is that they allow you to access and send information anytime and anywhere. But what if you leave a cable at home or bring the wrong one on a business trip?
BUSINESS
May 4, 2000

More enroll for Harley training than expected

Japan's first training course on maintaining Harley-Davidson motorcycles is proving a hit, with more people enrolling than expected, officials at a car mechanic school in Sendai said Wednesday.
COMMUNITY
Apr 23, 2000

Man of many parts puts dreams in action

It's not unusual to meet people who are adept at juggling. But dish-spinning is a whole new ball game -- the ability to conjure up one form of creative activity and set it in motion while starting up a second, third or more. Yet according to Milton Katselas, an American of Greek parentage based in Los...
COMMUNITY
Apr 20, 2000

Calligraphy with a global message

Tim Jensen confesses that the first time he saw Mitsuo Aida's calligraphy poems his immediate reaction was "I could do that!" Now Aida's greatest fan and translator of three volumes of his work into English, Jensen is not alone in his initial reaction. According to Aida's son Kazuhito, director of the...
COMMUNITY
Apr 9, 2000

Financial services fly at Banner

Some loudmouth once said that anyone who was in Japan during the bubble years of the late 1980s and had not made money -- a lot of money -- was a fool. Well, that makes me a dunce of the first order.
BUSINESS
Mar 31, 2000

Toyota, NTT Com to invest in stores' e-trade venture

Toyota Motor Corp. and NTT Communications Corp. (NTT Com.) said Thursday that they will invest in an e-commerce venture designed by five Japanese convenience store operators.
LIFE / Style & Design
Mar 30, 2000

The fun of slipsliding away

You persevered. You sweated, ignominiously landed on your backside and ignored the relentless pounding of fall after fall so that you could master the art of snow boarding. But now that you feel as cool on the slopes as you thought you looked when you first zipped up your baggy shell pants, you are helplessly...
BUSINESS
Mar 29, 2000

DoCoMo ordered to pay 11 billion yen for tax dodge

Tax authorities have said NTT Mobile Communications Network Inc. (NTT DoCoMo) and its group failed to properly declare a 26 billion yen-plus taxable investment in equipment for its personal handy-phone system over a one-year period beginning in April 1998, NTT DoCoMo announced Tuesday.
BUSINESS
Mar 29, 2000

Companies link to sell steel over Net

Nissho Iwai Corp. said Tuesday it will join two other Japanese trading houses in forming a joint venture to run an electronic marketplace for steel products on the Internet.
BUSINESS
Mar 29, 2000

I-mode Internet service down once more

Users of i-mode cellular telephones were unable to use the phone's Internet service for three hours Tuesday, less than a day after a similar disruption, the company said.
BUSINESS
Mar 28, 2000

Car manufacturer alliances aim to exploit partners' strengths

As Mitsubishi Motors Corp. on Monday announced a capital tieup with DaimlerChrysler AG, the dust may begin to settle from a series of realignments that have changed the landscape of Japan's automotive industry.
BUSINESS
Mar 28, 2000

DoCoMo to stake 1 billion yen in Sakura online bank plan

NTT Mobile Communications Network Inc. will invest some 1 billion yen in an online bank to be set up by Sakura Bank this summer, NTT DoCoMo officials said Monday.
CULTURE / Music
Mar 28, 2000

Tried and true not always the way to go

As mentioned last time in this column, a new restaurant/venue, Tribute to the Love Generation, will open in Odaiba on Tokyo Bay next month. It is not, as you may expect, a hangout for "Dead-heads," or ex-flower power hippies hiding out in Tokyo, but in fact will host mainly "world music" concerts. With...
JAPAN
Mar 25, 2000

Redress for 'karoshi' suicides eased

The Supreme Court's decision Friday upholding a lower court conclusion that an employer bore responsibility for its employee's suicide is a stamp of approval on a ruling that has led to revisions of labor administration policies.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami