“Sources for Japan’s Future Growth”

Japan’s economy is facing many challenges, including the declining birthrate, an aging
population and economic integration with East Asia. Is the future of Japan’s economy
still bright? Yuji Muranaga will examine sources of Japan’s future strength.
This talk will be in Japanese.

Panelist Bios

Yuji Muranaga has been Chief Executive Director of JETRO San Francisco since July
2006. He joined Japan’s Ministry of International Trade & Industry (MITI) in 1983, later
renamed Ministry of Economy, Trade & Industry (METI). He has served as director of
many key offices of METI including the Patent Office, Minister’s Secretariat, the
National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, and Industrial Science
and Technology Policy and Environment Bureau. He was a Consul at the Consulate
General of Japan in New York from 1999 to 2002.

About the series…
At the Japan Society of Northern California our Board of Directors is one of our greatest
strengths. Drawn from all corners of the business world, they are all experts in their
respective fields. It is with great pleasure that we offer you a chance to tap into that
unique fund of knowledge and expertise in our inaugural Japan Society Zadankai
(roundtable) series.

Over the next five months, the Zadankai series will bring you five intimate discussions,
on five topics, with five members of our Board. Participation in each discussion will be
limited to approximately 15 people to ensure a truly roundtable conversation.

“Summer Networking Event” at Hakone Garden

Event Pictures:

“You Can Make IT! Success for Foreign-Born Entrepreneurs & Executives”

Speaker:
Angelika Blendstrup, Ph D
Founder & Principal, Blendstrup & Associates

If you feel you that you might be able to better your chance of success with improved communications and negotiation skills, please join Keizai Society’s July event. This month, Keizai Society will present a panel discussion with successful foreign born professionals and look at the typical kinds of presentation skills they apply to talk to their companies or business groups in the Valley. There will be a practical training session on how to present a more professional and convincing message.

There have been many business books about great leaders but few books have focused uniquely on foreign-born entrepreneurs and executives, specifically ones living and working in Silicon Valley.

The book, They Made It!, is the result of conversations with these foreign-born Silicon Valley entrepreneurs such as Eric Benhamou, Jean-Louis Gassee, Raj Singh, Wu Fu Chen, Suhas Patil, Omid Kordestani, Qi Lu, Dan Maydan, who tell it as it is. Each leader shares a unique and personal perspective about how s/he came to the US and ultimately succeeded.

If you are established in Silicon Valley, or if you are just curious to find out what make these extraordinary individuals tick, come listen to how these foreign-born professionals think and gain some personal insights into the fulfillment of their ambitions and dreams.

In order to make this an effective training session, we will need ~ 3 volunteers to give a short 5 minute talk on a topic of their choice (it can be very technical) with immediate feedback on improving their presentation skills. Please send a message to dan@keizai.org in advanced if you are interested in being a participant/presenting.

RSVP by July 21th, 2008 to reserve your place!

Panelist Bios

Angelika Blendstrup, Ph.D., is the founder and principal of Blendstrup & Associates. She holds a Ph.D. in Bilingual and Bicultural Education from Stanford University and speaks five languages.

Angelika specializes in individualized, intercultural business communication training, accent reduction and presentation skill coaching. Because of her work with international executives and her role as President of Silicon French and LʼExecutive Club,, she got the idea of interviewing the fascinating foreign leaders who are quite accessible in Silicon Valley. With the help of her international friends in this community and the help of the executives themselves, she was able to interview more than 45 foreign leaders in 14 months.

In addition to They Made It!, together with an Italian colleague, she co-wrote Communicating the American Way, a guide to US business communications.

Angelika teaches US business communications skills to international executives in the Silicon Valley as well as classes at Stanford University on topics such as cross - cultural communication, managing virtual teams and the art of interviewing successfully.

“Is Japan Creating an Entrepreneurial Economy?”

Keizai Special Joint Program
with Stanford University’s US-ATMC

Speaker:
Prof. Yoko Ishikura
Hitotsubashi University

Sponsor:

Japan is at a critical turning point in 2008, with two opposing groups and views. One is the view that Japan, with its current social, political and economic system, will have difficulty renewing itself, while the other view is that the past success formula of a closed corporate innovation system supported by engineers and “hardware driven” technology is still viable.

With the accelerating pace of globalization and ICT, what will become of Japan, its private sector and public sector? Will its once-leading clean and green technologies survive and make an impact on the resolution of global issues? What are the potential areas for collaboration with the innovative and dynamic Silicon Valley?

As a professor of business strategy and innovation at the Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy at Hitotsubashi University, Dr. Yoko Ishikura teaches the Competitiveness and Problem Solving courses, is responsible for the Executive Opinion Survey in Japan for the Global Competitiveness Report of the World Economic Forum, and is a member of the Council for Science & Technology Policy at the Japanese Cabinet Office.

She was a board member of Japan Post and Vodafone KK and is currently a member of the board at Mitsui OSK Lines and the advisory board of All Nippon Airways. She received an MBA from the Darden School, University of Virginia and DBA from Harvard Business School. She worked at McKinsey Inc. Japan in the late 1980s. Her “Act Globally, Think Locally” was one of the breakthrough ideas for 2007 in the Harvard Business Review.

“Ingredients for Successful Entrepreneurship with Innovative Technologies”

Case studies of serial Indian and Japanese entrepreneurs

How destructive innovation is achieved?