Search - company

 
 
JAPAN
Apr 25, 2001

Hospitals hurt by competition

Medical institutions are struggling to survive in the wake of a government policy to curb national medical expenses from the current 30 trillion yen a year.
BUSINESS
Apr 25, 2001

Daiei's operating revenue falls below 2 trillion yen

Ailing supermarket operator Daiei Inc. said Tuesday it suffered a 10.2 percent year-on-year decline in fiscal 2000 operating revenue on a parent-only basis, bringing in 1.98 trillion yen and falling below 2 trillion yen for the first time in a decade.
BUSINESS
Apr 24, 2001

Reorganization of Kyoei Life now complete

The Tokyo District Court on Monday ended reorganization proceedings for failed mid-tier life insurer Kyoei Life Insurance Co., renamed Gibraltar Life Insurance Co. at the beginning of this month.
CULTURE / Music
Apr 22, 2001

Musicians take it back to the bridge

It's Saturday night, and the basement rock 'n' roll club Penguin House in Koenji is packed to bursting. As late-coming guests crowd down the stairs, the performer, Dai Yamamoto, takes the stage and tunes up his instrument.
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Apr 22, 2001

Big novels get the small-screen treatment

Jiro Asada won Japan's prestigious Naoki Prize for literature in 1997 for his novel "Poppoya," which was later made into a hit movie starring Ken Takakura. His followup, "Tengoku made no Hyaku Mairu (The One Hundred Miles to Heaven)," was published in the fall of 1998. Veteran TV director Katsumi Oyama...
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

TDK halts CD-R production in U.S.

TDK Corp. said Friday it is halting production of CD-R discs, videocassette tapes and floppy disks in the United States in the wake of slack demand, leading to a cut in its workforce to 250 from 580 at two U.S. plants.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Coalition to cut tax on small capital gains

The ruling coalition on Friday finalized proposals for revising securities taxes, which feature incentives for individual investors to boost flagging markets.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Chiyoda Life returns as AIG unit

Failed insurer Chiyoda Mutual Life Insurance Co. started anew Friday as AIG Star Life Insurance Co., with regaining customer confidence as the first order of business.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Apr 21, 2001

A time of rapid change and slow speech

Are you, or have you ever been, a member of the Japanese workforce? Like cards, you have been shuffled and dealt out to a different department or location within your company, as if you worked for Trump.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Mitsui to buy up Brazil mining firm

Trading house Mitsui & Co. said Friday that it will acquire all the shares of Caemi Mineracao e Metalurgia SA (CMM), a leading Brazilian mining firm, with an eye to selling half later to another Brazilian firm.
BUSINESS
Apr 18, 2001

Ministry to nudge NTT to cut stake in DoCoMo

Telecommunications Minister Toranosuke Katayama said Tuesday he will urge Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. to voluntarily craft and submit a business plan to increase competition among its group firms.
JAPAN
Apr 16, 2001

USJ attacked over disclosure stance

OSAKA -- Only a month into its grand opening, the management of Universal Studios Japan is under fire from citizens groups and the local media for refusing to divulge information about the park's operations.
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Apr 15, 2001

Love and commiseration, all in a day's work

Show-biz synergy reaches critical mass Saturday with the premiere of "Ashita ga Arusa" (NTV, 9 p.m.). The title, which translates as "there is a tomorrow," meaning you should work hard because the future is always staring you in the face, was also the title of a popular song by Kyu Sakamoto in the '60s....
JAPAN
Apr 14, 2001

Steel giants NKK, Kawasaki to join

NKK Corp., Japan's second-largest steelmaker, and Kawasaki Steel Corp., No. 3 in the field, announced Friday that they have agreed to integrate their operations in October 2002 under a joint holding company.
SOCCER / J. League
Apr 13, 2001

Brazil to play Tokyo Verdy

Brazil will play against Tokyo Verdy 1969 on May 26 (kickoff 5 p.m.) at Tokyo Stadium in a warmup for the Confederations Cup, the Japan Football Association said Thursday.
JAPAN
Apr 13, 2001

Disparaging title forces video delay

Sony Pictures Entertainment Japan Inc. was forced to stop release of a psycho-thriller video after receiving complaints from autistic patients whose condition is used in the Japanese title of the video, it was learned Thursday.
BUSINESS
Apr 12, 2001

NTT to tap into demand for Net

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. plans to establish a new company for high-speed fiber-optic Internet services as early as this summer under a three-year business scheme, company sources said Wednesday.
BUSINESS
Apr 12, 2001

Revised L-mode plans submitted for approval

NTT's two regional carriers on Wednesday reapplied for approval to launch a modified version of their L-mode Internet service.
BUSINESS
Apr 11, 2001

Nippon Life, Dai-ichi tie up to administer corporate pensions

Nippon Life Insurance Co. and Dai-ichi Mutual Life Insurance Co. said Tuesday they will jointly establish a company in October specializing in administering corporate pension fund assets.
JAPAN
Apr 11, 2001

Man guilty of selling fake cigarettes

The Tokyo District Court on Tuesday sentenced a 59-year-old company president to two years in prison, suspended for three years, for selling counterfeit Japan Tobacco Inc. brand cigarettes.
CULTURE / Music / J-POPSICLE
Apr 11, 2001

Trans-Pacific partnership serves up universal sound

A few years back, the big news on the J-pop scene was the "independent producers boom." Following the lead of the then-ubiquitous Tetsuya Komuro, freelance producers such as Takeshi Kobayashi (Mr. Children, My Little Lover), and Hiromasa Ijichi (Speed) were supposed to usher in an era in which a new...
JAPAN
Apr 8, 2001

Big tobacco stamps out antismoking campaigns

A number of prefectural governments have bowed to pressure from the tobacco industry and abandoned or downsized their antismoking campaigns, a Kyodo News poll showed Saturday.
COMMUNITY
Apr 8, 2001

How to escape the urban grind

After a grueling week at the office, we naturally look forward to getting outand about on the weekend. For diversions, Japan's major cities have it all, from art exhibitions and the latest movies to shopping and sporting events. Problem is, who wants to fight thesame workday-commute crowds at museums,...
BUSINESS
Apr 5, 2001

Sony, Toshiba to adopt open pricing

Toshiba Corp. and Sony Corp. said Wednesday that they will no longer assign prices to their main household electrical goods and will instead allow retailers to determine what customers should pay.
JAPAN
Apr 2, 2001

Cheap long-distance calls launched

Fusion Communications Corp. on Sunday launched its Internet-based domestic long-distance telephone service that charges users a uniform rate of 20 yen per three minutes for calls made to anywhere in Japan.

Longform

Figure skater Akiko Suzuki was once told her ideal weight should be 47 kilograms, a number she now admits she “naively believed.” This led to her have a relationship with food that resulted in her suffering from anorexia.
The silent battle Japanese athletes fight with weight