Beating Japan: How Hundreds of American Companies Are Beating Japan Now [Mass Market Paperback]

Francis McInerney (Author), Sean White (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1995

Timely and vital, this landmark book offers Americans up-to-the-minute strategies for succeeding against Japanese competitors. Showing how hundreds of American companies are already winning, this book provides a wealth of realistic ways to restructure U.S. businesses to prosper in today's unforgiving global market place. Based on the authors' 15 years of experience in Japan.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Deserving wider readership than among those whose business is in direct competition with Japan, this guide to restructuring American manufacturing concerns highlights customer relations. "You can focus, and share your customer's goals. Or you can work to your own internal agenda, and watch your business vanish," state the authors, New York City businessmen and analysts in the information technology industry. Concrete suggestions include closing corporate headquarters and moving all operations to regional sales offices and, every quarter, eliminating 5% of products in least demand. The authors suggest that the Japanese can be bested by competitors who reduce diversification, decentralize authority and maintain close contact with customers. While some of the information-technology terms are bewildering, the authors' thesis, comprehensive research (much of it done in Japan) and crisp prose bolster their valuable advice to business managers, whether their competition is a Japanese giant, K mart at the local mall or the Busy Bee Cafe on the corner.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Drawing on their business experiences dealing with Japanese firms, the authors offer numerous insights, strategies, and examples that American companies can adopt to beat their Japanese competitors. They indicate that Japanese corporate game plans of the 1980s have gone off track and that many companies have lost sight of the importance of the customer. To help American businesspeople take advantage of this situation, McInerney and White outline four counterstrategies. While some of their examples may be weak on proven and substantiated facts and full of business cliches, the authors supply a wealth of practical ways for American firms to compete successfully with the Japanese or anyone else (e.g., the regenerated European Community). For specialized business collections.
- Joseph W. Leonard, Miami Univ., Oxford, Ohio
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Plume (January 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0452272238
• ISBN-13: 978-0452272231
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,048,457 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Francis McInerney is Managing Director of New York-based North River Ventures LLC, a consultancy that advises CEOs on how the falling cost of information alters their business models and grades their management performance.

He is a limited partner in London-based GMT Communications Equity Partners Fund II, Europe's only telecom and media specialist fund, and is a member of GMT's Industry Council.

Francis is part of the general partner of Denver-based Centennial Ventures Funds VI and VII that specialize in early-stage telecom and media investing. The limited partners he brought into Centennial Ventures include: NBC, NTT Communications, NTT DoCoMo, Harris, GE Capital, Bell Canada, Nortel Networks, Alcatel-Lucent, 3Com, Crown Castle, and C2HM-Hill.

In 1976, Francis McInerney co-founded Northern Business Information, a telecommunications industry market research company. In 1988, after building NBI into the largest firm in its market worldwide, McGraw-Hill Inc. made an unsolicited offer to buy the company.

His venture clients range from annual sales of a few hundred thousand dollars to sales of a few hundred million. His corporate clients have sales of up to $100 billion. He specializes in building their business models and strategic partnerships.

Francis has written four books on the impact of falling information costs on business organizations, the first three of which he co-authored with Sean White:

* Beating Japan, E.P. Dutton, 1993.
* The Total Quality Corporation, E.P. Dutton, 1995.
* FutureWealth, St. Martins, 2000.
* Panasonic, St. Martins, 2007.