Comment by makeitdouble | Hacker News Reader

Comment by makeitdouble | Hacker News Reader

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We're talking about international trade, so trade barriers and foreign policies play a huge role that go beyond simple competition.

Japan had a hell of a time to deal with car exports in the US, SONY still won but the reaction to it was also extremely strong.

A Japanese company had absolutely no chance to go hit the US market and displace companies like SUN, Apple or IBM on the US soil. In particular software IP is a whole lot harder to fight for than manufacturing IP (even if it gets stolen, it's moot if it can't be physically applied. In software land reproduction is a given)

Europe wasn't much an easier target either. We saw that later with docomo failing miserably while having a clearly superior product.

In reverse the US has a long history of opening the Japanese market when they really want to, and forgoing that market isn't critical either, so there's quite an asymmetry.

The only ground Japanese company learned to properly fight has been video games so far.

> The only ground Japanese company learned to properly fight has been video games so far.

Nintendo yes; Sony PS division is more or less run out of SIE in San Mateo.

And the rest is nowadays mostly gacha developers, to which South Korea and China are also eating up their lunch, even at home.

Could you speak more to the US “opening the Japanese market when they really want to”? I’m not familiar with this.

A bit far from the technology related fields, but the beef import agreements are the most explicit on this part [0]. US beef was found in clear violation of the safety rules multiple times, but Japan had to bend anyway ("The government has put priority on the political schedule between the two countries, not on food safety or human health.").

Japan is typically not doing great in its relationship with Korea or China, or even India, nor the EU really (France and Germany are closely friendly, but won't give much economic benefits), so the US have a pretty strong leverage when it comes to negociations.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_beef_imports_in_...

PS: there's a mountain of other reasons now, but Japan and Russia were also not doing great as they've been fighting over the northern islands for decades. To my eyes they really really suck at international relations in general.

i.e. "open up your market to us and stay silent about our tariffs on your products, or else"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Ships#Gunboat_diplomacy

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plaza_Accord

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