How did Japanese companies, technology-supporting organizations, and governments reformulate organizational strategies, industrial structures, and institutions to revive Japanese high-tech industries (semiconductor, telecommunications, and biotechnology) in the 1990s? This book takes a comprehensive look at the question by integrating the fields of institutional economics and corporate strategy, an approach that will be of significant interest theoretically and empirically to scholars, professionals, and graduate students. Complex interactions among diverse technology-related actors are presented, focusing on co-evolution among market changes induced by technology innovation, macro-level institutional arrangements for innovation, and corporate strategies for survival. Insights are provided on diverse types of institutional arrangements, technology innovation policies, and management practices for companies and technology organizations.

Japanese semiconductor firms are well known for obtaining dynamics in a short period of time and achieving even global leadership. A significant portion of their success are attributable to cooperative interfirm relations and the development of intermediate organizational structure based on long-term relationship between firms. The purpose of this book is to explain how interfirm relations contributed to their dynamics during the golden age of the semiconductor industry. Meanwhile this book clarifies the real source of dynamics in interfirm relations and how the firms have interacted. The author concludes that the competitive-cum-cooperative (CCC) interfirm interaction are observed. Quantitative and qualitative findings show that firms enjoy not only flexible cooperation based synergy effects, but also dynamics market-like effects by creating competition among partners through CCC interaction.

The success or failure of inclusive business often depends on institutional interconnections. By examining case studies of inclusive business projects in India and several African nations, Institutional Interconnections and Cross-Boundary Cooperation in Inclusive Business asks how these connections can be developed to help alleviate poverty through business activities in developing countries. Conceptual orientations of what inclusion means can act to restrict the value orientation of an inclusive business project and its management practices. A significant approach of this book is an understanding that the economically disadvantaged have their own institutions to which they credibly commit, and that they are important, valuable, and dignified stakeholders or partners in an inclusive business project. By giving more weight to these institutions, it is possible to understand that some local companies may engage in inclusive practices by involving these actors as part of their regular business activities. Using concepts of mainstream, marginalized, and hybrid inclusion, this book explores the nature and characteristics of institutional interconnections in inclusive business in a study that will appeal to researchers and practitioners of strategy, international business, and corporate social responsibility.

Japanese semiconductor firms are well known for obtaining dynamics in a short period of time and achieving even global leadership. A significant portion of their success are attributable to cooperative interfirm relations and the development of intermediate organizational structure based on long-term relationship between firms. The purpose of this book is to explain how interfirm relations contributed to their dynamics during the golden age of the semiconductor industry. Meanwhile this book clarifies the real source of dynamics in interfirm relations and how the firms have interacted. The author concludes that the competitive-cum-cooperative (CCC) interfirm interaction are observed. Quantitative and qualitative findings show that firms enjoy not only flexible cooperation based synergy effects, but also dynamics market-like effects by creating competition among partners through CCC interaction.

Japan's technology support system has played a crucial role in developing firms technological capability and stimulating their innovation. How has it been done, and why is it effective? The research findings presented here show that what has worked best in Japan is inter-firm cooperative learning, which requires the support of public technology institutions to promote cooperation, disseminate technology, and facilitate innovation. Among the many books published about Japanese technology policies and corporate management, this is the first to show definitively that cooperative learning is important in a wide spectrum of firms, whether or not they are keiretsu-affiliated. With a caveat on the limitations of the Japanese system from an institutional perspective, the countrys techno-governance structure is revealed to be more effective in assembly-oriented industries than in those that are basic-science oriented and employ rapidly changing technology.

How did Japanese companies, technology-supporting organizations, and governments reformulate organizational strategies, industrial structures, and institutions to revive Japanese high-tech industries (semiconductor, telecommunications, and biotechnology) in the 1990s? This book takes a comprehensive look at the question by integrating the fields of institutional economics and corporate strategy, an approach that will be of significant interest theoretically and empirically to scholars, professionals, and graduate students. Complex interactions among diverse technology-related actors are presented, focusing on co-evolution among market changes induced by technology innovation, macro-level institutional arrangements for innovation, and corporate strategies for survival. Insights are provided on diverse types of institutional arrangements, technology innovation policies, and management practices for companies and technology organizations.