Japanese electronics companies. Japanese God: Why Sony, Toshiba and Sharp Have Forgotten How to Make Electronics. Purely Japanese goods

MOSCOW, October 26 - RIA Novosti, Natalia Dembinskaya. The other day the Japanese corporation Toshiba has warned: it will end the current financial year with a loss of one billion dollars, it will have a large tax payment on the sold division of microprocessors. IN recent times the manufacturer focused on nuclear power, and not to say that it is doing well: last year, for example, it lost five billion dollars in market value. Its closest competitor Sharp is not doing well either - due to the drop in demand for LCD screens, in which the company has invested earlier. Other Japanese are also steadily losing positions: Sony and Panasonic, well-established players in the global consumer electronics market, are selling off now unprofitable assets. Who and why sent the pioneers of the market to retire - in the material of RIA Novosti.

Absolute leadership

Some 10-15 years ago, the products of Japanese companies were considered premium and high quality - buyers all over the world were eager to have them. The Japanese practically took over the consumer electronics market - they made TVs, microwaves, and digital music players. Toshiba, for example, was the first in Japan to begin manufacturing digital computers, transistor TVs, and microwave ovens in the mid-1950s. In the 1980s, she became the first to make laptops, holding the leadership in this niche for several years. And in the 1990s, it was she who invented the DVD format and released the first DVD players.

Another pioneer of the market - Sony - has the famous Walkman cassette players, which have become a symbol of the corporation for many years, and its later hit, the Sony PlayStation game console.

One of the most profitable for the company was the production of televisions. "People lived in homes with Sony TVs, a phenomenon called Sony homes," said Forrester Research analysts.

Even though Japanese products were expensive, the high price tag seemed to tell consumers that you are paying for quality and innovation. And they were willing to pay, and the Japanese were really innovative. For this reason, Japanese second-tier players such as JVC, which developed the VHS video standard, have also won the respect of consumers.

Quality is not up to par

A devastating blow to Japanese companies was dealt financial crisis 1997 year. Toshiba, in particular, carried out a large-scale reorganization, laid off several thousand employees and closed a number of divisions, and its key business- personal computers - lost almost 90% of net profit over the year.

The situation was complicated by the fact that the company began to make mistakes in production. In 1999, Toshiba laptops were flooded with claims for more than a billion dollars because of a faulty floppy drive.

Sony also took the wrong path - it sold its TVs all over the world, but with the arrival of South Korean companies, fans of the Japanese brand began to turn away from it: it turned out that Korean TVs are cheaper and larger, and the difference in quality is small.

Koreans attack

Observers note: South Korean Samsung Electronics was the first to cross the Japanese road. In the last decade, this low-cost manufacturer turned out to be much more efficient than clumsy Japanese competitors.

Where exactly did the Japanese manufacturers lose? Firstly, almost all of them were not ready for the transition to flat panels. And if at the early stage of increasing competition and reducing business margins, large Japanese companies were still afloat, then the weaker players - JVC, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Toshiba, NEC and Pioneer - all went out of business.

Samsung and LG began to set the tone for the market. They launched a feature-rich flat-panel TV at a competitive price and began to aggressively expand their market share. As a result, it was they who became the new leaders in this segment, and their Japanese rivals were left far behind.

Conservative Japanese are faced with another problem: a large number of once innovative products that were in demand in previous years are no longer needed by anyone. In the age of streaming services, few will need a DVD or Blu-ray player. Sales of digital music players are also falling - they are easily replaced by smartphones.

Slept through the mobile market

Japanese companies also missed the development of the mobile market. For example, Sharp tried to make smartphones for the United States, which few people have heard of, and Panasonic tried to develop the Eluga line of smartphones, but to no avail: both lacked influence and resources.

Sony was tied to joint business with Ericsson, which was quite successful at one time. The second wind was given to her by the release of the Xperia line, but with the advent of the iPhone, it became clear: Sony is a rather weak competitor in the mobile market.

Later, Google arrived on the market with the Android mobile platform, and while the Japanese were thinking about the prospects for a growing and far from perfect platform, Samsung and the young Taiwanese manufacturer HTC quickly found their way to the situation, seizing the initiative.

The war for the smartphone market has been even fiercer than that for the TV segment, with Apple and Samsung effectively carving up the market, leaving the very few to benefit from the mobile division.

Thus, like many other giants of past years, the companies of the Land of the Rising Sun did not react to the changes in time and surrendered under the onslaught of aggressive external competitors. Observers do not rule out that the Japanese players have a chance to return to their former glory, but only if they again offer something revolutionary. So far, however, they obviously have not succeeded, and not everyone is striving to regain their former positions. Panasonic, for example, said it is reorienting itself from the consumer electronics sector to the b2b segment.

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More recently, Japanese companies such as Sony, Panasonic and Sharp have deservedly been considered leaders in the consumer electronics market. They made everything from premium TVs to microwaves to inexpensive MP3 players, and it seemed like the dominance would last forever.

Technique famous brands from the Land of the Rising Sun in stores has always been more expensive than non-Japanese counterparts, but was in stable demand, since the buyer was willing to pay for Japanese quality. Even today, Sony and Panasonic are in every home, although the market situation is not changing in favor of the Japanese.

Over the past few years, Japanese electronics manufacturers - giant multinational corporations have turned from owners into outsiders of the market, literally fighting day after day for the opportunity not to work at a loss. Recently, Moody’s agency, for the second time in several months, announced a downgrade of Sony's long-term debt rating from Baa2 to Baa3, which was another consequence of the catastrophic decline in demand for its products for the company. Sharp Corporation, whose net loss in fiscal 2012 is projected at $ 5.6 billion, is likely to be forced to seek help from the Japanese government to avoid bankruptcy. Panasonic management has already announced a new sale of the company's assets with a total value of about $ 1.4 billion and its intention by the end of the 1st quarter. 2013 to lay off another 10 thousand employees.

The financial collapse not only heralds a very, very dramatic change in the fortunes of a number of Japanese corporations that were once at the top of the global consumer electronics market, but also means that the time when Japanese companies showed amazing success in several different business areas is already gone.

In this regard, one cannot fail to mention South Korean, which, while creating its patchwork business empire and adhering to a similar strategy over the past 10 years, today also “does everything”, but nevertheless achieves significantly greater success than its Japanese competitors. At least for now.

Big is slow
So what happened? Why are Sony and Sharp having such difficulties? There can be no simple answer to these questions. However, as with many other downfall stories, one of the main causes of the problem in this case lies in the neglect or misunderstanding of the changes that were taking place in the market. Foreign competitors turned out to be more calculating and far-sighted. When the consumer electronics market began to shift to digital, mobile electronic devices, the Internet and special software products, including gaming applications, Japanese manufacturers tried in every possible way what is called “to be in trend”, despite the number of these “trends”. But it began to grow, which is why the goods exported from Japan also began to rise in price in foreign markets. As a result, Japanese companies were forced to reduce the profitability of production, which was the beginning of the financial complications that are taking place today.

Think of TVs labeled Made in Japan - this is perhaps one of the most illustrative examples of the Japanese's failed strategy. Sony, Sharp and a number of equally well-known Japanese brands produced the world's best TVs and completely dominated this market segment while all TVs were CRT. The famous Trinitrons had an impeccable reputation for a quarter of a century and were considered the standard of the highest quality, and Sony for several years in a row was the world's largest supplier of color TVs. But there were that were not better, but just thinner than CRT TVs. The consumer immediately liked the flat and more convenient LCDs in terms of dimensions, although they were inferior to CRT models in terms of color rendition, clarity, brightness and saturation of the picture. And so the transition to the production of new flat-panel TVs was not successful for all Japanese manufacturers. Having extensive experience in this business, at the stage of the formation of the market, TV with LCD screens made significant profits, but the competition grew at an extremely fast pace, new players appeared, and soon the Japanese began to be crowded out.

Competitively weaker brands - JVC, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Toshiba, NEC and Pioneer, although not immediately, were still forced to curtail the production of consumer TVs in Japan, i.e. actually got out of this business. They were replaced by South Korean LG and Samsung. Samsung, in particular, focused on improving the quality of its LCD TVs, increasing the number of additional features and optimizing the cost, over time, began to expand its market share. As a result, today TVs manufactured by Samsung Electronics for the most part surpass analogs of Japanese brands both in functionality and design.

In general, flat screens and HD-format have led to the fact that the TV market began to resemble the computer market in many ways: today the TV is no longer just a talking box in the room, and not even an element, it is actually a large computer with access to Network, wireless modules, a whole range of compatible peripheral equipment, interfaces, etc. But many Japanese companies turned out to be unprepared for such a change in the seemingly long-established business model.

As you probably already understood, it's not just about TVs. The problem is strategy. Many well-known Japanese manufacturers, facing financial problems, continue to release new models of music, DVD and BluRay players, while consumers in wealthy American and European countries (the most profitable markets) are already switching to streaming audio and video.

Mobile failure
In the nascent mobile phone market, Japanese companies have also been very profitable. At first. Panasonic and Sharp focused their main efforts on winning the domestic consumer, although the potential of both companies allowed them to successfully promote their products in other countries of the world. Sony, already having experience in this area, created in 2002 a joint venture with Ericsson, a well-known Swedish manufacturer of telecommunications equipment, specializing in the production of both conventional and mobile phones. Thanks to the development and implementation of a number of advanced and design solutions, Sony Ericsson relatively quickly managed to win back its market share from the then leaders - Finnish Nokia and the American (only in 2004, Sony Ericsson's share grew from 5.6% in the first quarter to 7% in the second).

The global market suddenly changed at the very beginning of 2007, or rather, it was changed, moreover, not the main rivals of the Japanese - Nokia and Motorola. January 9 Steve Jobs presented to the world the first iPhone, which not only Panasonic and Sharp, but also Sony Ericsson had nothing to oppose. Phones are a thing of the past - consumers love smartphones. And a year and a half later - in September 2009, Google announces a new mobile operating system Android, which many leading manufacturers, including Japanese, were in no hurry to take seriously. But the more proactive Samsung and quickly switched to Android, and the Japanese again found themselves in the role of catch-up.

But most importantly, the competition in the new smartphone market turned out to be even more fierce than in the TV market, so this business became successful only for a few companies, and the Japanese were not among them. Of all the major players so far, only Apple and Samsung are able to generate significant profits from the sale of their mobile devices.

As for Japanese manufacturers, only Sony has any noticeable chances to stay in this market, mainly thanks to the upcoming flagship Android smartphone Xperia TL - the very one with which 007 chases the villains in the 23rd part of Bondiana, once again saving the world and the honor of British intelligence. By the way, the film "Skyfall" is also a Sony product.

The company has released several smartphones for the American market, but even there, these models are little known. Panasonic tried to enter the European market with new series smartphones, but for the successful promotion of this line of resources and authority on the market, the company today is clearly not enough. Moreover, according to the Wall Street Journal, Panasonic will soon be completely phasing out smartphone sales in Europe. The reason is in the extremely difficult financial situation: according to the results of 2012, the company's losses will amount to about $ 9.6 billion.

New challenges
In the next few years, most Japanese consumer electronics manufacturers expect even more radical shocks. Therefore, it may happen that not everyone will survive.

Among three crumbling empires on this moment Sharp is in its worst condition. According to the latest data, which was published just a few days ago, in the first six months of the 2012-13 fiscal year, the company lost 387.6 billion yen (about 4.87 billion US dollars), which is almost 10 times more compared to the same period in 2011. Today Sharp is restructuring: more than 10,000 jobs have already been cut and the company's management is considering the possibility of selling production facilities to Taiwan's Foxconn. Sharp hopes this will generate additional cash flows.

Suffering losses in the consumer electronics market, Sony and Sharp are trying to compensate for some of the losses by reorienting some of their factories to produce components for other, more popular brands. For example, Sony makes cameras for, and Sharp is one of several manufacturers of displays for these same devices. However, even these decisions are not salutary, since the component market is also extremely saturated and it has to be won back from competitors that constantly offer lower prices.

Recently, Panasonic President Kazuhiro Tsuga, who took office in June this year, openly announced his desire to completely move away from the consumer electronics market. According to the New York Times, Mr. Zuga also expressed the opinion that there is no place in the company for a manager who cannot provide at least 5% profit. However, even in spite of such an extremely tough attitude of the management towards its employees, Panasonic may soon really leave the consumer market. According to Reuters, in the first half of 2012-13 fiscal year, the company's net loss is expected to be 765 billion yen (about 9.6 billion US dollars) and could become the second largest in Panasonic history after a record loss of 772 billion yen in 2011. This year, the company is also forced to abandon dividend payments - for the first time since 1950.

Against the backdrop of Sharp and Panasonic, Sony - the maker of PlayStation consoles and the owner of the Hollywood video and recording studios - seemingly has a better chance of survival thanks to its diversification. However, things are not so rosy with Sony Entertainment either. Insiders constantly talk about "freezing" deals and the loss of projects. The release of the new Ghostbusters is reportedly seriously delayed for the simple reason that screenwriter Ethan Cohen requested and received such a royalty for Men in Black 3 last year that the company had to take a time out before proceeding. for the filming of "Hunters".

Today, Sony plans to focus on entertainment, developing areas of cinema and gaming, as well as strengthening its position in the mobile electronics market. According to the published report by Sony, the company's net loss for the 6 months of 2012-2013 financial year decreased by 5% to 40.1 billion yen (514 million US dollars). Nevertheless, Sony has lowered its forecast for the sale of mobile consoles PSP and Vita, TVs and digital cameras. Only sales forecasts have not changed, so Sony still has something to rely on.

New rivals
The Japanese are restructuring in an effort to improve the profitability of their products, but their competitors are also not sitting idly by. Japanese companies are constantly under pressure not only by American and Korean manufacturers, but also by the rapidly developing Chinese. There are plenty of examples.

Lenovo has once again confirmed the strength of its positions in the segment, having recently published a report on a new sales record in the US market (total volume of about $ 8.7 billion) and a significant expansion of its market share. Of course, the Chinese successes are someone's losses, because Sony and Toshiba are slowly but steadily turning into outsiders of the American (most profitable!) PC market.

On the global "smartphone" front, the Chinese Huawei and ZTE are showing no less striking success, each year gaining new percentages and shares, actively strengthening both in the lower and in the high price segments. In the United States, both companies have yet to overcome the resistance of the main market players, but the low cost of Chinese smartphones and tablets allows ZTE and Huawei to achieve good results even in an extremely competitive environment, and in a short time.

The Chinese threat is potentially high in the TV market as well. Leading Chinese TV manufacturers TCL and Hisense are just taking the first steps to promote their products in the United States. The main competitive advantage in this case is already traditional - low price. However, this does not mean that both companies offer cheap "firewood" in the US. Hisense, for example, recently unveiled a relatively inexpensive 4K HightEnd-class model, released specifically for US retail. According to experts, TCL and Hisense will receive their share of the American TV market in the next two to three years. Given the pace with which the Japanese Sharp, Panasonic and Sony are losing ground, it is not difficult to guess whose place the Chinese will take.

What is the bottom line?
The Japanese are working. I work hard and with concentration. Sony is steadily expanding its presence in the gaming consoles and applications market. According to experts, the company's success in this area today depends on the effective integration of devices from different product groups into a single whole, like Samsung, which creates high-tech ecosystems based on the interaction of TVs, tablets, smartphones and even household appliances.

Panasonic is known to remain on the list of keynote speakers for the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show in January 2013, which is an indirect confirmation of the company's desire to stay in the industry for at least another year.

Sharp announced a revision of its forecast for its own losses for the current fiscal year, and also warned investors about "serious doubts" about the possibility of staying in business. The statement was the reason for speculation about the imminent bankruptcy of Sharp. And it is not unreasonable: in February, after similar "doubts", the Japanese company Elpida Memory, once one of the largest manufacturers of memory chips for computers, declared itself bankrupt.

In the meantime, most experts agree on one thing: Japanese consumer electronics manufacturers are going through extremely difficult times today and are faced with problems that are very difficult to solve, so they cannot yet count on good headlines in the press.

Toshiba, Mitsubishi and other "shibas": what do you hear in my Japanese name?

It just so happened that the Japanese culture of words burst into our language without our permission, so to speak, by the right of a leader. While we were promoting our proud but lonely domestic brand "SPUTNIK", the Japanese, without any hesitation, after without the Second World War, hid their grievances away and raised the domestic manufacturer. The ups and downs of the formation of the most famous Japanese brands in our time is a topic for a separate material. About how, for example, the Sony brand was invented and promoted, you can write a separate article.

However, today the conversation is not about that. Yes, of course, during the period of formation, each company tries to bring to international market a brand that sounds equally good in most languages. As a result, we get Sony, Panasonic, although sometimes it does not do without punctures: what is the same Duron, which at one time pretty much amused Russian fans of AMD products ... Or DuraMax?

Nevertheless, today we will talk about the etymology of the "native" names of Japanese companies. It is clear that the Sony brand is an exclusively artificial marketing entity, and Matsushita is the surname of the company's founder. What about other well-known Japanese brands? Let's try to delve into the addiction, paying attention to the spelling of hieroglyphs ...

Today, in our research, the TechJapan website will help us, which has set out to consider the word formation of such neologisms as FujiFilm, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Panasonic, Mitsubishi, Sanyo and Toshiba. The study pursued two main goals: to find out what the hieroglyphs that make up the brand name actually mean, plus the historical background that gave rise to these names.

The meaning of research? I hope you understand that the guys named Mr. Sanyo did not exist in nature. ;-) The more interesting it is to delve into the roots of this phenomenon.

Once again, we will write and carefully consider the list of the above companies:

FujiFilm
Fujitsu
Hitachi
Panasonic
Mitsubishi
Sanyo
Toshiba

You may be surprised, but only one of the seven companies mentioned above was named after its creator. It so happened that fairly quickly post-war Japan, which has an area comparable to 1/8 of the United States, managed to grow and bring the volume of the gross national product to second place in a short time [ Hairpin: Japan's military budget also has the second largest volume in the world, however, today we will not "get hung up" on this].

In total, in a fairly short time, the country, which suffered from total isolation in the 19th century, managed to become XXI century one of the leaders of the world economy, by the way, without any special prerequisites for that in the form of raw materials or domestic mineral resources, exclusively "with their own hands." However, today the Japanese are credited not so much with their hard work and perseverance (as it turned out, the same Chinese and Koreans have this "gift" to no less degree), but the ability to manage a team. This is what Japanese electronics became famous for.By the time Japanese companies entered the world market, there was a need for non-Japanese names, or at least brands that non-Japanese could understand.

This is how Japanese legends were born ...

Company name: Fuji Photo Film Corporation
Name on hearing: FujiFilm
How it looks in the letter:

What it looks like in traditional spelling:

I think even the darkest ignoramus "knows" that this is the name of the national shrine of Japan, Mount Fujiyama. Please note: Fuji - Firumu. When writing the second part of the name, not kanji characters are used, but katakana.

I believe that the desire to immortalize Fuji in the name of their company at one time arose in more than a dozen successful Japanese businessmen. It also originated with Mr. Asano, the owner of FujiFilm. Legend has it that he had such a desire during a vacation in the vicinity of Fuji, however, it turned out that by that time someone had already "grasped" the sonorous name. After lengthy negotiations, Mr. Asano nevertheless bought the name from competitors, having laid out a terrible sum of ...? 8000 for this. I don’t know how much this amount "weighed" in those days, nowadays you can only buy a DVD-RW drive for that kind of money. However, history is full of such examples, it is enough to recall, for example, the price paid by the Dutch settlers to the Indians for the island of Manhattan ...

Fujitsu Corporation - Fuji again? Yes, again. In Japanese it looks like this:

Or in traditional spelling:

The merger of Fuji and Tsuu (something like "cross", "reach") led to the emergence of the Fujitsu brand, and the whole company name looks like this - Fuji Tsuushinki Seizou Kabushikigaisha, or Fuji Communication Equipment Manufacturing Corporation. The abbreviation, finalized by Fujitsu, became valid in 1967.

What do you think is the meaning of the Hitachi name, which Hitachi Corporation took for itself? This is how it looks in the usual ...

and traditional ...

Writing.

As it turned out, Hi is nothing more than "Sun" or "Day", although the spelling of kanji also implies "Japan", of course, depending on the context. The second part of the company's name - Tachi, means something like "formation", "appearance". In a word, the Voskhod motorcycle is straightforward, and nothing more. %)

However, not all so simple. It turns out that in the Japanese province (prefecture) of Ibaraki there is such a town - Hitachi, and in fact the company got its name in honor of the ancient mine in this city.

Perhaps one of the most popular companies in Russia is Matsushita Electric Industrial Corporation, better known as Panasonic (TVs), although in certain circles it is also remembered for other brands - Technics (audio equipment) and National (household goods). The brand writing looks like this:

or in a traditional way like this:

You can, of course, dig deeper into the etymology of the word Matsushita, it turns out, for example, that Matsu means "pine", and Shita means "under". No, don't be fooled by conjectures, in fact, the Matsushita brand got its name in honor of the company's founder, Mr. Matsushita, and to investigate who was there "sitting under the tree" is tantamount to decoding the Russian surname "Chekushkin". It's not worth it. %) Sound trademark Panasonic appeared much later, when there was a need to enter foreign markets.

Do not assume that Japanese industry developed suddenly and immediately throughout the 20th century. The country's history is replete with brands no less ancient and honorable than, say, IBM, Krupp or Siemens. One such name is Mitsubishi Corporation. This is what the name of the company looks like in a modern way.

So - in the traditional form:

Mitsubishi is a very, very ancient Japanese company, suffice it to mention that the application for registration of a company under the name Tsukumo Shokaiin was filed by its owner Mr. Iwasaki Yataro back in 1870. Literally three years later - in 1873, the company received the name Mitsubishi Shokai, and since 1934 the Mitsubishi corporation has been reorganized into a number of diversified companies such as Mitsubishi Shipbuilding, Mitsubishi Electric and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which, by the way, played an important role in the development of militaristic Japan those times.

Okay, "who remembers the old, he will be out of sight." The name of the company consists of two parts: Mitsu is the number - 3 and Bishi (or hishi, if you read the kanji correctly), which means "faceted diamond" or simply "diamond". What, in fact, is clearly reflected in the company's logo - three diamonds.

The etymology of the name Sanyo Electric Corporation is very instructive. It turns out, unlike Sony's artificial education, the Sanyo brand does mean something. This is how the modern spelling of a company name looks like,

So - in the traditional:

As we already know, the first symbol is "Three". But the second part of the company's name - You, means "ocean", although, sometimes, depending on the context, it can also mean "west" (not in the sense of "west of Asia", just "west").

By the way, the first character in Chinese also means the number "3". Yes, yes .. the east has its own style of numerals, although the traditional Arabic style is also used. It is especially fun when both are alternating.

Believe it or not such an interesting coincidence, Toshio Iue, the founder of a company with the beautiful romantic name Sanyo, not only loved the sea, but also is brother-in-law to fellow Konosuke Matsushita - the very one who invented Panasonic. Truly, the ways of the Lord are inscrutable!

It is difficult to overestimate the contribution of Toshiba to the "notebook building", "player building" and many other useful endeavors. Perhaps it will be a revelation for you that Toshiba is none other than the pioneer of the Japanese "mobile building" and the founder of one of the largest mobile operators in the country, au KDDI. This is how the spelling of the company name looks like in the generally accepted styles:

The name Toshiba is also the result of a synthesis of two components: Tou, which means "east", and Shiba, that is, "batiste" (or "grass", depending on the meaning of the text).

Not quite clear? I also did not understand until I learned the background of the brand. In fact, the Toshiba name came about after the merger in 1984 of two industrial giants - Tokyo Electric and Shibaura Manufacturing. The result is Tokyo Shibaura Denki, which in short sounds great like Toshiba.

Surprisingly, but the first character in Chinese also means "east", but pronounced like Doong. But they do not have a second hieroglyph. Interpenetration of cultures?

The company, it should be noted, is also one of the oldest in Japan, since the founding father of Shibaura Manufacturing, Hisae Nakata, registered his brainchild as Nakata Manufacturing back in 1875.

Summing up our short excursion, I would like to note with regret that a lot of other interesting names with exclusively Japanese names remained outside the scope of the study - for example, Onkyo or Casio. I think that in the future we have many interesting topics for conversation. Are you interested in the origins of brands like Canon, Nikon, Kawasaki? Can you imagine how deeply you can dig, understanding the history of the emergence of Korean-Chinese-Taiwanese companies? In short, write, your feedback will help us navigate the topics of future publications ...

We are very grateful to TechJapan for the material that served as the basis for the preparation of this publication.

The earth, in its continuous movement, inexorably draws time forward. It runs like water in a full-flowing river, dragging along with it events of varying significance. Some of them are like small pebbles, and some resemble huge boulders. Suddenly the water throws them ashore and continues its movement without them. They fall out of the epicenter of its seething stream, become inanimate bodies outside of time and outside of action. It is difficult to predict whether the water will raise them again and whether they will be drawn into its current.

Often, observing such phenomena, we do not think about the reasons and only state the fact that this or that giant disappears from our field of vision and goes into oblivion. So, just recently, the legendary Japanese manufacturers of premium brands of consumer electronics, today give up their positions in the market to South Korean, American, Chinese companies and fail. Sony, Panasonic, Sharp could not withstand the competition, could not adapt to the rapidly changing demand. One of the bells and whistles of the decline of the era of Japanese electronics was a Sony Wega projection TV found among trash in New York.

Most recently, Japan produced almost all popular products of this category, their high prices reflected the idea of their high quality, Forrester analyst Tony Costa said that people "are used to having Sony at home and do not see anything else", but today people have turned their backs on them ... Japanese brands' TVs, microwave ovens, digital music players have moved to the bottom of the charts, while companies themselves suffer losses, accumulate debt and have to fight for existence in order to make any profit.

Today, due to debt, Sony has risen one notch in the unfavorable rating of Moody's Investors Service for the second time in a month. Sharp showed itself on stock market this year, as a big loser, he is forced to seek salvation from the Japanese government in his current unenviable condition. The whole world expects that at one point Panasonic TVs will disappear from the shelves forever, as the company has already indicated its intention to get rid of unprofitable enterprises.

Japanese manufacturers have descended today from the heights of the Olympus of consumer electronics almost to its very foot. Wanting to embrace the immensity, trying to spread their influence over a huge number of different spheres, they could not hold the conquered heights and were forced to leave the pedestal. Nowadays it is hard to believe that the former success will be able to return to them again. NPD Group analyst Stephen Baker noted that this is already generally recognized today, as well as the growing popularity of the South Korean company Samsung Electronics, its entry into the favorites of the inexpensive and insignificant market players.

What caused the Japanese giants to fall so precipitously that they went astray as they climbed to the top of the consumer electronics world?
Among the main reasons for the withdrawal from the market of the famous Sony, Panasonic, Sharp, as in the case of most falls, one can name the lack of a timely response to the dynamically changing market trends. The giants turned out to be too bulky and heavy for quick maneuvers, which is why they were easily bypassed by actively developing companies from South Korea, China and the United States. An economic factor such as the growth of the Japanese yen contributed to their early collapse, as it led to an increase in the price of Japanese exports and limited sales within the country.

The television business provides the most compelling picture of the shift in leadership in the consumer electronics market. During the transition of the market to digital media, the expansion of the Internet media space and the growth of demand for software applications, the Japanese made every effort to keep their finger on the pulse of life. They also responded vividly to the emergence of mobile devices in the market. Japanese manufacturers led the market in the era of bulky cathode ray tube televisions. Sony Trinitron has been a symbol of impeccable quality and the highest degree of reliability. During this period, Sony, Panasonic, Sharp were able to oust a number of weaker players from the market, among which were such names as JVC, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Toshiba, NEC, Pioneer. However, few of the leaders of that period succeeded in the transition to flat television screens while maintaining their previous positions.

At this time, South Korean manufacturers LG and Samsung threw all their strength and reserves into creating flat-panel TVs that meet the new requirements, advanced features, modern design and competitive price. Gradually increasing their market share, they took a leading position, displacing Japanese manufacturers. It is their brands that are the gold standard at the moment. As modern TVs moved closer to PCs, flat panel displays and HD, the former leaders were not prepared for the transition, Baker said. Plus, for longer than consumers wanted it to be, they continued to release products that became obsolete with the move to streaming devices, such as music CD players, DVDs, or Blu-ray players.

Absence in the mobile market
The absence in the mobile market was another reason for the collapse of Japanese companies. They missed their chance by limiting themselves domestic market... The production was not efficient enough to allow companies to compete in the global market. Only Sony, having linked itself with the Swedish company Ericsson, initially had some success, but then the union became burdensome for further development and fell apart. At this moment, Apple, having appeared on the mobile market with its iPhone, left them almost no chance. Other companies, such as Samsung and HTC, appreciated the young and growing Google Android platform in a timely manner and, unlike Japanese manufacturers, took advantage of the opportunity given to them and took the remaining market share.

The smartphone business has turned out to be as ruthless to Japanese companies as the television business. In fact, Apple and Samsung split the bulk of the profits among themselves, leaving only a small fraction of it to other players. Among all Japanese companies, perhaps, only Sony Xperia, which in some way was helped by the famous James Bond, who held the phone of this brand in the film "Skyfall", is capable of tearing at least a small piece of this pie today.

Several Sharp models on the American market are barely popular. And Panasonic is failing in its drive to export Eluga smartphones due to a lack of influence and resources. According to The Wall Street Journal, the company has already abandoned its intentions to bring its product to the European market.

Fall of the giants
As a result of these events, Sharp is doing the worst. The company reported a loss for the first half of 2012 of 387.6 billion yen, which equates to $ 4.87 billion. This amount has doubled compared to the same period last year. During this time, more than 10 thousand jobs were cut and the question of selling factories to Foxconn was considered for the sake of raising any funds.

Panasonic, according to experts, may disappear from the consumer electronics market altogether, as it has more profitable production for the company. This intention was confirmed by the President of the company Kazuhiro Tsuga, and, even, according to the New York Times, he threatened to fire all managers who did not bring the company at least 5% of income in any area of the company's business. At the end of last year, the company's loss amounted to 67.8 billion yen or 853 million dollars.
Sony looks most favorably against this background, thanks to its strong presence in the gaming industry with its famous PlayStation console, as well as in the entertainment sector, as it owns Hollywood film and recording studios. The company connects the prospects of its development and retention in the market with this area, as well as in the promotion of its mobile devices. Televisions will most likely remain just a hobby for Sony. The company has the greatest prospects among other Japanese electronics manufacturers.

Who will take the place of Japanese manufacturers in the market
An increasing influence in the consumer electronics market, along with companies from the United States and South Korea are purchased by Chinese manufacturers. Their success is evident. Lenovo recently set a record $ 8.7 billion in PC sales, confirming its growing dominance in the segment. PCs and laptops from this manufacturer replaced the declining share of Sony and Toshiba computer equipment.

In the market of cell phones and smartphones, the influence of Huawei has significantly increased and ZTE companies have managed to expand their influence and, along with budget devices, offer the world worthy premium devices. So far, these companies have not managed to break into the US market, but, most likely, after a while, attention will be paid to their affordable smartphones and tablets.

In the television market, the growing competitiveness of Chinese companies is also becoming more acute, among which TCL and Hisense are currently in the lead. Although today they are still poorly represented on the US market, they are already making active steps in this direction. They are gradually moving away from making cheap TVs, and already this year Hisense introduced high-end 4K models to the US market. Most likely, both companies have a chance to gain market share in the coming years.

Thus, it is the Chinese companies that are now occupying the vacated niches after the withdrawal of Japanese consumer electronics brands from the market.

Will Japanese brands be able to stay on the market?
Of course, Japanese manufacturers do not sit idly by and make desperate attempts to revive the business. But at the moment, all these efforts are more like a struggle to survive than to promote their own brands. Today, in order to save enterprises, companies have switched to the production of components for their more successful competitors. For example, Sony began to supply cameras, and Sharp - displays for the famous "Apple" smartphones. However, this way of earning at least some means of subsistence is under threat, since the last piece of the pie can be taken away at any moment by manufacturers offering lower cost of parts.

According to analysts, Sharp has the most risks of leaving the market. The reason for this is the poor location and the too limited number of production options.

Panasonic still, as experts think, will try to switch to other areas of production in order to make a profit. The company intends to unveil its core business at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, but there is no word yet on the nature of the exposure.

Sony has the best chance of success, analysts say. In fact, it was the only Japanese company that managed to retain some market share in the segments of TVs, tablets, smartphones and household appliances. The company clearly has the prospect of retaining its market share and increasing its market power by integrating all of its products, following the path of Samsung.

However, none of the experts at the moment undertakes to determine what awaits Japanese companies in the future, and how successful their attempts will be to get out of the crisis. However, it is clear that they will have to overcome a difficult path full of obstacles and obstacles.