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BUSINESS
Dec 29, 2000

100 yen stores now the shopping craze

Relatively new to a Japanese retail scene long dominated by now-suffering high-priced department stores and supermarket chains, 100 yen shops are catching on.
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2000

'Pachisuro' firm hit with penalties for unpaid taxes

Aruze Corp., Japan's largest manufacturer and seller of "pachisuro," a cross between pachinko and a slot machine, has been accused by tax authorities of concealing about 4 billion yen in income between fiscal 1996 and fiscal 1998, industry sources said Thursday.
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2000

Century reaches last work day

Employees of public organizations and many private companies experienced the last business day of the century in various ways across Japan on Thursday.
BUSINESS
Dec 29, 2000

State oil firm to help drill Azadegan

Japan National Oil Corp. said Thursday it has decided it will participate in a project to develop Iran's largest oil field, the Azadegan field, situated near the Iraqi border.
BUSINESS
Dec 28, 2000

Nintendo denies it is in talks to buy Sega

Video game giants Nintendo Co. and Sega Corp. on Wednesday denied a New York Times report that Nintendo is negotiating to buy Sega.
LIFE / Digital
Dec 27, 2000

PlayStation2 shortage buoys up Sega

Sega started off on the wrong foot when it launched its 128-bit Dreamcast game console in Japan Nov. 27, 1999, and has been unable to regain its balance ever since.
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2000

Lotte tax evasion, 200 million yen fine

Major Tokyo-based confectionery maker Lotte Co. has been ordered to pay an estimated 200 million yen in penalties and back taxes for bookkeeping errors and failing to properly declare income in the four years to May 1998, industry sources said Monday.
BUSINESS
Dec 26, 2000

Oji group to combine sales of cardboard

Oji Paper Co. said Monday that it will set up a joint firm with three of its group companies to integrate sales of corrugated cardboard components and improve delivery times.
JAPAN
Dec 23, 2000

Snow Brand set to shut Osaka plant

Snow Brand Milk Products Co. said Friday it will permanently close the Osaka plant that produced tainted milk products that caused widespread food poisoning last summer.
BUSINESS
Dec 23, 2000

Nippon Life, Sumitomo Mitsui in insurance tieup

Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp., to be launched in April through the merger of Sumitomo Bank and Sakura Bank, will tie up with the Nippon Life Insurance Co. group to sell insurance products at its outlets, industry sources said Friday.
BUSINESS
Dec 22, 2000

Firms' entertainment outlays off 13.3%

Japanese firms nationwide spent 4.39 trillion yen on entertainment, gifts and other expenses in the year through last Jan. 31, marking a 13.3 percent drop from the previous year, according to a government survey released Thursday.
LIFE / Digital
Dec 20, 2000

Government, industry reassess potential harm of video games

SEATTLE -- Can games desensitize children and teach them how to kill? Video and computer game violence is such a hot topic in the United States that the U.S. Senate has held two sets of hearings on the matter, and several senior senators each year host a conference in which they discuss problems with...
EDITORIALS
Dec 19, 2000

Structural reform is still key

The Japanese economy seems to have hardly improved in the past three months and appears likely to slightly worsen in the next three. This dim picture is painted by the Bank of Japan's latest "tankan" survey, which sums up how business managers view their companies' performances. The economic perception...
BUSINESS
Dec 19, 2000

Daiei names more stores for closure

Ailing supermarket chain operator Daiei Inc. said Monday it will shut down its stores in Chiba Prefecture's Narita and Kisarazu and four other outlets by the end of February as part of a rehabilitation program that will shutter a total of 32 shops.
CULTURE / Music
Dec 19, 2000

K-beat knocking on Japan doors

Within moments of taking the stage of the Pasha Club in the downtown Tokyo district of Nishi-Azabu, Drunken Tiger, a hip-hop duo from South Korea, had the trendy club-goers dancing frantically to its beat-heavy sound.
JAPAN
Dec 18, 2000

Businessman found with gun, bullets

OSAKA -- Police found a businessman in possession of a handgun and five rounds of ammunition at his home Saturday night while investigating a suspicion that he had handcuffed and confined an employee.
BUSINESS
Dec 16, 2000

Canadian firm reaches agreement to buy insurer

Government-appointed administrators for Daihyaku Mutual Life Insurance Co. reached a basic agreement with Manulife Financial Corp. of Canada to take over the failed midsize insurer's operations, a life insurance industry association said Friday.
JAPAN
Dec 15, 2000

Obara pleads innocent to rape

The man police say may be connected to a high-profile hostess-abduction case pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges of drugging and raping two other foreign women.
BUSINESS
Dec 13, 2000

Olympus plans foray into genetics

Olympus Optical Co. will begin supplying genetic medical support systems and related services in April in the hope of generating 30 billion yen in sales in the new field in 2005, it announced Tuesday.
MORE SPORTS
Dec 13, 2000

IMG a major player in pro sports

What do people think of when you mention IMG? For most, it's money, for some it's exploitation, for others it's sports promotion, and, thanks to my friend Rick Roa at IMG's Tokyo office, for me it's the Playmate twins Carol and Darlene Bernaola.
JAPAN
Dec 10, 2000

Efforts afoot to boost foreign students' career opportunities

KOBE -- In an ongoing effort to forge stronger ties between Japan and her home country of Myanmar, Kobe University graduate student Thin Aye Aye Ko has spent recent years working as a translator, interpreter and even tour guide.
JAPAN
Dec 9, 2000

Sogo executives ordered to pay 6 billion yen

The Tokyo District Court on Friday ordered ex-Sogo Co. Chairman Hiroo Mizushima and 16 other former executives to pay about 6 billion yen to the department store chain for mismanagement in a series of shady and allegedly illegal business deals.
BUSINESS
Dec 7, 2000

Retail chains under siege

Conventional Japanese supermarket chains, which are suffering dwindling sales and being cold-shouldered by consumers, will be dealt another blow with the advance of foreign retail giants wielding aggressive business plans into the Japanese market.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Dec 7, 2000

SMAP star finds true love, new role

When the public recently learned that 28-year-old idol Takuya Kimura was marrying singer Shizuka Kudo, who is already four months pregnant with his child, the SMAP-man's image immediately changed from sex symbol to . . . well, actually, the image still seems to be under construction.
EDITORIALS
Dec 6, 2000

Getting real on the Net

The Gallic gall. A French court has done the unthinkable. It has ruled that the French government has jurisdiction over cyberspace, or at least that part of the digital universe that overlaps with its physical borders.
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
Dec 6, 2000

Ready for takeoff

The pipes are clogging. There are 377.65 million people online worldwide, and some analysts warn that figure could increase by as much as 25 percent annually for a few years to come. Traffic could reach 10 times the current level in a few short years, and demand for bandwidth might reach as high as 200...
BUSINESS
Dec 5, 2000

Firm says air conditioners pose fire risk

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. said Monday that some of its air conditioners produced from 1988 to 1996 could malfunction and catch fire.

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