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EDITORIALS
Jul 8, 2012

Rakuten's English drive

E-commerce giant Rakuten kicked its English policy into high gear last week, as English became the official language for the Japan-based company. Founder, chairman and CEO Hiroshi Mikitani has promoted, or rather "forced," English to become the company's official language.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jul 1, 2012

Innovation, marketing by the book doesn't hold in globalized world

Creativity and innovation hold the key to being competitive in a global environment, but what does it really take for a company to recruit or build innovative talent?
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jun 1, 2012

Fuji Heavy eager to discuss Toyota Camry contract

Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd. President Yasuyuki Yoshinaga said the maker of Subaru cars is preparing to begin talks to renew its contract to build Camry sedans, the best-selling car in the U.S., for Toyota Motor Corp.
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
May 22, 2012

Once one and only, Sony seeks to regain that status

Despite reporting a record ¥457 billion annual loss last year, Sony Corp. earlier this month said it would return to the black in fiscal 2012 with a ¥30 billion profit.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 10, 2012

After flower-vase success, former D-Bros designers set to blossom

If you're the sort of person who likes art museums but loves art museum gift shops, then you're likely to be familiar with the work of Yoshie Watanabe and Ryosuke Uehara, two designers who are currently the subject of an exhibition at Tokyo's Ginza Graphic Gallery.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 21, 2012

Goldman Sachs has a long history of duping its clients

Greg Smith doesn't know the half of it.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jan 22, 2012

Can showbiz really sever yakuza ties?

Last August, comedian and TV emcee Shinsuke Shimada retired from show business following allegations that he'd been palling around with an underworld figure. His withdrawal came on the eve of the implementation of a well-publicized police crackdown on organizations that work with antisocial elements,...
Japan Times
LIFE
Jan 8, 2012

Stop the presses and hold the front page

It was perhaps the biggest financial story of postwar Japan — or it should have been.Yamaichi Securities, one of the nation's four top brokerages, which was among the world's six largest in the 1980s, had in 1992 started to illegally bury millions of dollars in red ink off the books, setting up dummy...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Dec 4, 2011

Tenten Hosokawa: Drawing the blues away

In the last few decades, clinical depression in Japan has emerged from its longstanding obscurity shrouded in shame and guilt to becoming far more openly recognized as a national disease.
COMMENTARY
Nov 15, 2011

Scientific mind meltdown

In a survey conducted more than 10 years ago, Chikio Hayashi, former director of the Institute of Statistical Mathematics, polled people's opinions toward the statements of two hypothetical airlines with regard to airplane accidents.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Nov 2, 2011

Sony regroups ailing TV business

Sony Corp., struggling to rebound from seven consecutive annual losses in television manufacturing, has reorganized the business into three groups.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Oct 18, 2011

Insulation maker working to meet growing demand

Mag-Isover K.K., the Japanese unit of French building-material conglomerate Saint-Gobain, is ready to meet growing demand for insulation in the disaster-hit Tohoku region and elsewhere and expects the nation's energy-saving efforts to continue for years to come.
EDITORIALS
Oct 9, 2011

The man who dented the universe

Steve Jobs, the visionary entrepreneur, passed away at the age of 56. Few people have had a more profound influence on the world. Mr. Jobs' genius lay in his ability to see technology for what it is — a tool that has the capacity to transform how we live.
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Sep 18, 2011

Get your kicks in Japan

Walk the streets of Tokyo's trendy Harajuku and Shibuya shopping districts and the sheer variety of fashion worn by people passing by can be, to the uninitiated, simply mind boggling. But, look at their feet and more often than not they are wearing shoes that are more familiar — sneakers. Even if at...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 13, 2011

Young dancers reap fruits of choreographer's expertise

Kimiho Hulbert danced before she could talk. Crawling backstage between dressing rooms of her Japanese mother and British father, both professional dancers in Belgium where she was born, Hulbert even disdained her first official ballet class at 2 years old as "too babyish."
BUSINESS
Jul 13, 2011

Elpida eyes ¥79.7 billion via share, bond sales

Elpida Memory Inc. plans to raise ¥79.7 billion selling shares and convertible bonds.
BUSINESS
Jul 8, 2011

Firms branching out to mitigate disaster impact

Fears of power shortages stemming from the Fukushima nuclear disaster are prompting companies to move to the western part of the country or even overseas to reduce the risk of unexpected business disruptions.
BUSINESS
Jul 1, 2011

Defiant Tepco rallies utilities around future of nuke power

Tokyo Electric Power Co. led utilities in rallying around a nuclear future, defying growing public opposition to atomic energy amid the Fukushima No. 1 plant accident.
BUSINESS
Jun 2, 2011

Mitsubishi Estate targets 17% gain in operating profit by March 2014

Mitsubishi Estate Co. is targeting an increase of 17 percent in operating profit in three years as it redevelops buildings in central Tokyo and expands overseas.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
May 24, 2011

Cheap labor market will have to make do without Chinese workers

The flight of cheap labor following the earthquake may have a lasting effect on Japan's economy.
EDITORIALS
Apr 30, 2011

Learning from train tragedy

Six years have passed since the April 25, 2005, train crash on West Japan Railway (JR West) Co.'s Fukuchiyama Line in Amagasaki, Hyogo Prefecture, in which 106 passengers and the driver were killed, and 562 others were injured. In the ensuing years, people have been asking why the accident occurred and...
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Apr 12, 2011

'Judge not,' 'fly-jin' and saving electricity: views from readers

Some readers' responses to Roberto De Vido's "Judge not, lest you be judged" (March 22), Darek Gondor's " 'Fly-jin' face fallout from decision to go" (April 5), and Darryl Magree's March 29 letter:
BUSINESS
Jan 26, 2011

Inpex has debt-cost advantage over China

Japan, surpassed by China as the world's second-largest economy, has one advantage in competing with its neighbor for natural resources: lower borrowing costs.

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