Japan - Nikkei Value and The Disappearance of Japanese Brands

Nikkei trades at only a few percent of where it would be if it had tracked the Dow since the Nikkei collapsed in December 1989.  It is only 50% of where it was then.  Greatest and longest equity wipe out in history.

All those great Japanese brands of decades ago age gone, gone, gone.

There are no Apples and Googles to replace them.

What was once the second largest economy in the world will soon be a backwater off the coast of Asian, a weak Chinese feudatory.

Why?

FC metrics tell the story.  Information Velocities of Japanese companies aides are terminally slow

ERP is patchy and often not used at all.  Rarely use the same instance for the same applications in different countries.  So customer information goes nowhere.  Cannot be translated into cash quickly or easily.  The unApple.

No women anywhere.  In 30 years of advising Japanese CEOs -- I am the only foreigner ever to have done so, let alone for so long, I have only met one woman with direct reports and that was a few months ago.

Business processes unchanged for 60+ years!!

Francis McInerney
francis@northriver.com