Multinational Companies from Japan: Capabilities, Competitiveness, and Challenges

Since the bursting of Japan’s bubble economy, from 1990 onwards, its multinational companies (MNCs) have faced new competitive challenges, and questions about the management practices on which they had built their initial success in global markets.

Japanese engagement in the international economy has undergone a number of phases. Historically, Japanese MNCs learnt from foreign companies, frequently through strategic alliances. After the post-war ‘economic miracle’, Japanese manufacturers in particular converted themselves into MNCs, transferred their home-grown capabilities to overseas subsidiaries, and made an impact on the world economy. But the period after 1990 marked declining Japanese competitiveness, and asked questions about the ability of Japanese MNCs to be more responsive and global in their strategies, organization, and capabilities. It has been argued that the established management practices of Japanese MNCs inhibited adaptation to recent demands of global competition.

This volume presents new case evidence on how Japanese MNCs have responded to the new challenges of the global market place, and it provides examples of how they have transformed strategies and competitive capabilities. This book was originally published as a special issue of Asia Pacific Business Review.

Robert Fitzgerald is a Reader in Business History and International Management at Royal Holloway, University of London, UK. He specializes in business history, Asia Pacific business, and multinational enterprise, and he has recently published Rise of the Global Company: Multinational Enterprise and the Making of the Modern World (2015).

Chris Rowley is Inaugural Professor of Human Resource Management at the Cass Business School, City University, London, UK, and Adjunct Professor at Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. He is the editor of the book series Working in Asia and Asian Studies, and has published widely, with over 500 journal articles, books and chapters and other contributions in practitioner journals, magazines and newsletters.