Transformation of Japanese Multinational Enterprises and Business: The 50th Anniversary of the Japan Academy of Multinational Enterprises

The purpose of this book is to highlight how current successful Japanese multinational enterprises (MNEs) and companies have changed their business or business models in the past three decades. Japanese MNEs received a lot of attention from academia and industry during the 1980s and the early 1990s, and their factors for success have been compared with those of Western MNEs. Unfortunately, following the collapse of the “bubble economy” in the early 1990s, international business researchers and practitioners’ attention has turned away from Japan and its MNEs to emerging markets, notably the rapidly growing China.

Japanese MNEs have faced the mature domestic economy and also have had to overcome many new challenges in the twenty-first century, such as rapid aging, depopulation, and response to new technologies. Japanese MNEs and companies today are being forced to respond to new business environments never seen in the past. The prerequisites for business activities have significantly changed from those of former Japanese companies and their management practices. Even in such a difficult situation, however, many Japanese MNEs and emerging companies have achieved steady growth and have succeeded by changing their business models.

This book provides the reader with new directions for research and lessons by analyzing the challenges of Japanese multinational enterprises and emerging companies. The redirection of attention is expected to have a positive impact on the field of international business study and practice.

Shige Makino is a professor of management at Kyoto University’s Graduate School of Economics and an emeritus professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). He earned his Ph.D. from Ivey Business School and holds both an M.B.A. and a Law degree from Keio University. Before his appointment at Kyoto University in 2021, he spent 26 years teaching at CUHK Business School. Prof. Makino has taken on leadership roles in several international business associations, such as vice president of the Academy of International Business, president of the Association of Japanese Business Studies, and executive director of both the Japan Academy of Multinational Enterprises and the Japan Academy of International Business Studies. He boasts an extensive publication record in leading journals and is the only recipient of the JIBS Gold Medal from an Asian institution.

Yasuro Uchida (Ph.D, Yokohama National University) is Professor of strategic management at Graduate School of Business, University of Hyogo, Japan, and Professor Emeritus of University of Toyama. He was a member of technology standard council of Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan. His research interest is competitive strategy, and the international standardization of technology. His book “International Standard and Strategic Alliance” (in Japanese; Chuokeizaisha, Tokyo, 2001) received the award from Japan Academy for International Trade and Business (JAFTAB) in 2001. He is a board member of the Japan Academy of International Business Studies (JAIBS) and the Japan Academy of Multinational Enterprises (JAME).

Tamiko Kasahara (Ph.D., Kobe University of Commerce) is an Assistant Professor of international human resource management at School of Management and Information, University of Shizuoka, Japan. She is currently a visiting scholar in the management department at Bentley University, U.S.A. She received her M.S. and Ph.D. from Kobe University of Commerce in 2002 and 2008, respectively. Her research focuses primarily on global talent management in multinational corporations, with a recent emphasis on organizational behaviors. Her book, Global Human Resource Management in Japanese Multinational Corporations (published in Japanese by Hakuto Shobo, Tokyo, 2014), received accolades including the Best Book Award for Young Researchers from the Japan Academy of Multinational Enterprises (JAME) in June 2015 (Tokyo, Japan), and a collaborative paper that she authored with Professor T. Sekiguchi in 2020 earned the Palgrave Macmillan Best Paper Award from The Association of Japanese Business Studies (AJBS) in July 2020 (Miami, U.S.A). She serves on the boards of JAME and Japan Academy of International Business Studies.