The corporate overhaul includes cutting thousands of jobs from Sharp’s global workforce, its first layoffs since 1950, in a bid to chop about $1.3 billion in fixed costs from its sagging accounts.

The news for Japan's electronics firms just keeps getting worse. It would appearthe management of these firms lacked the vision and skills needed to take them into a global marketplace. Japan's protectionism could only save them from their own mistakes for so long, especially since the Japan market is shrinking.

I don't disagree with your remarks, herefornow. In Sharp's case, it was never that dynamic or influential a company and got a bit too ambitious and greedy, expanding mainly through short-term demand (no more than 3-4 years) for flat-screen TVs in the leadup to July 2011, plus its LCD panels for cell phones. It gambled and lost. The Kameyama factory tried to flaunt Sharp's status as one of the few remaining domestic LCD panel makers, but this kind of appeals to consumer nationalism don't carry the same weight now that they did in the 1970s or earlier. Sharp has never been able to come up with a true product hit that enabled it to dominate any particular sector. Even Casio has been able to do that, with its portable calculators (in the past) and G-Shock digital watches.

herefornowAug. 18, 2012 - 11:55AM JST

The news for Japan's electronics firms just keeps getting worse. It would appearthe management of these firms lacked the vision and skills needed to take them into a global marketplace. Japan's protectionism could only save them from their own mistakes for so long, especially since the Japan market is shrinking.

It's going to get worse. Sharp was the classic business model of copy and improve, rather than innovate. There used to be a section of their R and D department whose sole job was to surf the internet and discover what other comapnies were developing.

I can;t find it, but there is a great article somewhere that talks about the negative effects of rapid change on the Japanese tech economic model. It basically states that change now is so rapid and original, that the Japanese model of copy and impprove is now redundant. By the time the Japanese have copied and impproved someone's innovation, the tech world had gone to the next innovative stage.

Sharp was a classic example of a company that 'copy and improve' tech model.

VirtuosoAug. 18, 2012 - 12:18PM JST

it was never that dynamic or influential a company and got a bit too ambitious and greedy, expanding mainly through short-term demand (no more than 3-4 years) for flat-screen TVs in the leadup to July 2011, plus its LCD panels for cell phones. It gambled and lost.

The Kameyama factory tried to flaunt Sharp's status as one of the few remaining domestic LCD panel makers, but this kind of appeals to consumer nationalism don't carry the same weight now that they did in the 1970s or earlier.

Hit the nail on the head... good post.

Another sad story on the electronics industry of Japan

Great idea for Sharo and any other Japanese electronic companies to cut their staff. Those cuts should be in S. Korea and China and even Pakistan, Thailand and India. Too much technology has been "stolen" and other jobs "lost" within Japan. About time action is taken to correct that. There is enough "qualified" Japanese workers that are "unemployed"!

"Price" and "cost" for immediate profits is NOT the answer. "Stability" in business, quality, production and qualified skilled employees within one's country over the long term is much more important. When will the Japanese learn that they "gave away" all that was good and profitable to other countries. Save some jobs locally and cut those in other countries... Japanese government and "questionable Immigrant" foreigners already send enough subsidies overseas.

kazetsukaiAug. 18, 2012 - 10:41PM JST

Great idea for Sharo and any other Japanese electronic companies to cut their staff. Those cuts should be in S. Korea and China and even Pakistan, Thailand and India. Too much technology has been "stolen" and other jobs "lost" within Japan.

That was the whole point about Sharp assembling Aquos in the Kameyama factory and it has, in terms of cost, proven a disaster for Sharp.

@kazetsukai - being xenophobic and blaming foreigners for Sharp,s inept oyaji management team and their lack of vision is not going to help. If Sharp does what you say they will be gone within a short time frame. Maybe that is what J Inc needs though - a lot of them will not change until they are at the edge of the abyss. Perhaps a few high profile J company failures will wake them up and finally make them face reality.

@titaniumdioxide "Another sad story on the electronics industry of Japan" The first TV set was a Sharp so durable that grew with me during long years. Samsung was by then an unknown electronics manufacturer that came up with very low end items even the most nationalist Korean consumers rejected. However, the story turned around in a matter of a decade with roles being exchanged -- my Korean friends affirmed that the Korean industrialists have each a list of must- do missions to accomplish that is served as an important 'driver' : among the doctrines as priority no.1 : beating head-on the Japanese counterparts in their respective field..Samsung Electronics & LG appear to have followed the national objective -- in the process of ousting the giants Sony, Matsushita not to mention the smaller ones like Sharp..

This is an outcome of poor management not focusing on Innovation and Invention of products. They were not investing enough on the products in the past decades. I am sorry for these innocent victims who are losing jobs.