Management of Technology and Innovation in Japan - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 3540253262 ISBN 13: 9783540253266

Publisher: Springer, 2005

Synopsis

What Makes this Book Unique? No crystal ball is required to safely predict, that in the future – even more than in the past – mastered innovativeness will be a primary criterion distinguishing s- cessful from unsuccessful companies. At the latest since Michael Porter’s study on the competitiveness of nations, the same criterion holds even for the evaluation of entire countries and national economies. Despite the innumerable number of p- lications and recommendations on innovation, competitive innovativeness is still a rare competency. The latest publication of UNICE – the European Industry - ganization representing 20 million large, midsize and small companies – speaks a clear language: Europe qualifies to roughly 60% (70%) of the innovation strength of the US (Japan). The record unemployment in many EU countries does not c- tradict this message. A main reason may be given by the fact that becoming an innovative organi- tion means increased openness towards the new and more tolerance towards risks and failures, both challenging the inherently difficult management art of cultural change. Further, lacking innovativeness is often related to legal and fiscal barriers which rather hinder than foster innovative activities. Yet another reason to explain Europe’s notorious innovation gap refers to insufficient financial R&D resources on the company as well as on the national level. As a result, for example, hi- ranking decisions on the level of the European Commission are taken to increase R&D expenditures in the European Union from roughly 2% to 3% of GNP.

About this title

Synopsis

This book provides a profound overview of Japanese ways of managing innovation, looking at various relevant levels such as strategy, processes, organization, culture and implementation. Within this framework, contributions by both researchers and practitioners deal with aspects such as the fuzzy front-end of innovation, the role of knowledge in new product development, supplier integration, product architecture, multi-project management and intellectual property rights issues. Case studies serve to illustrate how new product development projects are carried out in Japan and comparisons with practices in Western countries allow for the identification of differences and similarites between management practices in these different cultural regions.

Edition details

• Publisher: Springer
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 3540253262
• ISBN 13: 9783540253266
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 429
• Editor: Herstatt Cornelius, Stockstrom Christoph, Tschirky Hugo, Nagahira Akio