A Drone You Can Ride On

Drone is small, so you cannot ride on it.
But there is a big drone that you can ride on, named
"Sky Drive". Sky Drive is being developed by CARTIVATOR that
is not a company but just a group that consists of automotive
engineers.

The shape of Sky Drive is like drone and the present size
is a little small for humans to ride on. That has 4 propellers
and can fly at a height of 10-20m. That can move at a speed of
100-150km/h and can continue to fly 5km.

The engineers dream is to show it at the opening ceremony of Tokyo
Olympic in 2020.

The Challange to establish Omni Channel in Japan

In Japan real stores and virtual internet stores are
trying to harmonize, someone call that "Omni Channel".

SevenEleven, the most biggest retail conglomerate, are
trying to unite their all the channel. The way they try
to realize is to sell and receive their all the goods though
all the channels, even if the formats of retail stores are different
like convenience store, department store, specialized store...

Lawson, the second largest convenience store, is trying
to expand their user base by forming affiliation with other
companies. For example, Lawson are discussing with Rakuten,
the most biggest e-commerce retailer in Japan, about
affiliation of point business and channel integration.
Customers will be able to be given Rakuten point when
they buy something at Lawson and receive goods at Lawson
they bought at Rakten e-commerce site. Both of them help
Lawson increase the number of customers.

Japan has a lot of networks of convenience stores, and
someone think convenience stores are key to succeed in
integrating real stores and internet stores.

Effective Logistics by Nitori

Logistics is important for all companies that deal with
substances. Moreover the amount of shipment are increasing
because of the growing market of e-commerce.

Nitori, which is the biggiest retailer manufacturing and selling furnitures,
announced that they will share the network of
their logistics with competitors. Nitori plans to receive orders
to ship competitor's furnitures for their customers. Nitori
think this measure makes their logistics more cost-effective.
They can fulfill their trucks with full loads, and moreover
they can get money from competitors.

Nitori is know as cost-effective company. This measure may
make them more competitive because competitors cannot beat
them by the cost. If competitors couldn't find alternative
way for shipment, and then competitors use Nitori's logistics,
competitor's cost of shipment results in being more expensive than
Nitori.

Foreign Investors toward Japanese Apartments

A lot of Japanese luxury apartment are owned by foreigners,
especially the portion of the Chinese investors are increasing.
The Nikkei Business magazine said, 10% to 20% of luxury apartment
in Tokyo are owned by the Foreign investors.

The problem also increasing as the number of them are increasing.
Some Japanese residents feel the next rooms are noisy. They say
people who are in the next door vary week by week. It seems
sometimes couple, it seems sometimes families and it seems
sometimes group of friends.

The foreign investors rent their rooms though the internet site
like Airbnb. The return through those site is 15%, on the other hand,
the return through real estate companies is 4%. The number of foreign
investors seems to increase continuously even though Japanese
residents don't hope so. The Japanese government are considering
to loosen the law that regulate renting room services because
we are short of hotels for the Tokyo Olympic in 2020.

I think the surge of investing apartments by foreigners will
continue to increase.


reference:Nikkei business July 27, 2015

Nikkei won the competition to merge FT

We were surprised by the news that Nikkei News Corp. will
merge FT. The reason we were surprised was Japanese people
normally think it is difficult to go into global market
in the news domain, therefore Japanese news companies
don't do the actions like this merger.

I think this merger is very effective. The economy and
the field for businesses became global more and more, so
to report the business activities, media have to have
networks all over the world.

Nikkei will obtain global networks through this merger.
They will have two big networks both in Asia and Eroupe.
They will be able to gather more detailed information
effectively. We expect that their news will contain
more detailed fact and meaningful insight.

the position of Facebook in Japan

Facebook is struggling in the Japanese Market, the article of
Diamond Online said.
http://diamond.jp/articles/-/74404

-The number of users in Japan is approximately 23 million that
is only 20% of the population. Their TV commercial was on the
air last autumn, but they failed to increase users. The sales
of advertisement was less than planned numbers between
April and June.
-Their organization doesn't seem to function. The previous
president resigned Facebook Japan suddenly,and some people said
that proved the communication between Facebook Japan and
Facebook headquarters are under bad condition.
-The advertisement companies doubt of Facebook because
the change of algolithm Facebook did affected badly for
the results of advertisement.

Aside from these points, the competitor of Facebook is
very strong in Japan, that is Line. We can use Line more
casually and we often use it as main message service.
Line also release new fascinated services like game,
music streaming, payment, shopping and so on.

If Facebook eager to survive as a multiple servicer
that fights with Line or other strong competitor, it is
very difficult to get main position in Japan.

Panasonic's House-Related Business

Panasonic's focusing domains are house related business and automobile business.
Regarding the house related business, they announced that they will increase
the number of stores by 40% that offer house-reform service. The number will
become 10,000 in 2018.

The reason they can increase stores is they have already established
small store networks called Panasonic Shop. When the Japanese economy
was growing in 1970s-1980s, they made a lot of Papa-Mama shops
all over Japan, and now they will change these stores to be able to
receive orders of reforms.

This is a good way to strengthen their house related business because
the demand of reforms are great and they can leverage their strong assets.
Other than reform business, they plan to strengthen energy efficiency
business, nursing care business and abroad.

Can Sony recover?

Sony has been struggling these years. But the president Hirai said in the
general meeting of stockholders on Jun 23 that the condition that surround
Sony are changing toward profitable one.

They announced that their growth domains are device, game and movie&entertainment.
Typical electric devices like LCD and mobile phone were excluded, and the
most important thing for those domains were to make profitable businesses;

Japanese consumer electric companies are moving from consumer goods to
industrial devices like Panasonic, Hitachi etc... But Hirai said "We don't
quit consumer goods business". It is interesting to keep looking at Sony's
recovery.

Solar Power Plant in India by Soft Bank

Soft Bank is expanding their business very quickly toward global.
They announced that they will develop solar power plants in India.
They will make joint company with Hon Hai, and invest in the business
$200 million.

Soft Bank started their Solar Power Plant business after the
disaster of Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, then they haven't
grown the business for a while. We doubted the seriousness of the president
Mr.Son. But now we can believe it.

IOT ventures in Japan

Some startups are focusing on developing IOT devices and services.
Some of the Japanese IOT start ups are introduced in the today's
news article.

>Photosynth
They are developing smart locks. Your smartphone can be connected
to the lock attached on the door through bluetooth(BLE), then you can
open it by touching your smartphone. You can buy it at retail store.
http://photosynth.co.jp/


>Atomoph
They are developing "atomoph window." This window is digitalized and
you can watch variety of scenes, for example river, forest,city...etc
They are planning to make a lot of contents and make continuous profit
while selling contents.
http://atmoph.com/ja/

>Cerevo
They are manufacturer that makes variety of products from professional
to private use. They shorten the term to develop their products by
using 3D printer.
https://www.cerevo.com/ja/index.html


source:Nikkei News Paper 2015.06.22