Mizuno Corporation
Mizuno had both 260 directly managed stores in department stores mainly and 642 franchise shops at the end of 2008. The incoming restructuring plan in Chinese operation would be taken in 2009 due to disappointing sales after the Beijing Olympics.
Mizuno rapidly increased its presence in China over a few years. It has employed marketing initiatives as supplying shoes to Chinese Olympic table tennis players and sponsoring China's baseball league for the Beijing Olympics but never kept up with international major brands Nike Inc. in the US and Adidas AG in Germany with huge advertising budgets.
Tokyo International Book Fair 2009
According to the web site, TIBF2009 is explained as follows,
Quote: As the leading event in the world's 2nd largest publishing market, TIBF is the best venue to find the latest releases in all genres - fiction & non-fiction, business & economics, education, how-to's, manga & comics, all types of magazines, and many other specialty books.
| USA | Japan | |
| Number of golf course | 16,000 courses | 2,400 courses |
| Golf population | 2,870M | 830M |
| Penetration rate of golfers | 12.6% | 9.8% |
| Number of playing golf per year | 18 times | 11 times |
| Average Fee of playing golf | 5,300 yen | 11,850 yen |
Japanese love golf in that penetration rate of golfers are just slightly smaller than that of U.S.A. although playing fee in Japan is twice as high as that in USA. In addition, golfers love consuming tons of money onto golf goods or wears.
The popularity of playing golf in Japan is different story than how much golfers love playing golf, though. Japan Golf Association shows gloomy future of golf population in Japan. It foreseen that golf population in 2010 is 10.33 million, compared to 12.7 million in 1990, 14.5 million in 1994 and 12.9 million in 2000. So Japanese golf goods companies must play games outside Japan. 
Japan Golf Association
Study of demographic change of golf population by generation (in Japanese)
In December 2007 Quiksilver, Inc. sold 100% of the stock of its subsidiary Cleveland Golf Company, Inc. to SRI Sports Limited, an owner of Srixon Golf with $132.5 million transaction value. Thus SRI Sports Limited announced that Cleveland Golf Company, Inc. acquired U.S. sales a subsidiary of SRI Sports Limited to sell two flagship brands such as Srixon and Cleveland Golf in October 2008. US Sales of SRI Sports Limited stayed at 2.3 billion yen in FY2007 while market shares of golf ball was merely two per cent. SRI Sports Limited aims to boost US Sales to 24 billion yen in FY2007 after the meager of Cleveland Golf Company, Inc.
SRI Sports Limited
The ongoing financial turmoil, however, is affecting the strategy of the third biggest manufacture of sportswear and sports-related products Descente Ltd. in South Korea.
According to an article “Descente to open fewer golf wear stores in S Korea” of Nihon Keizai Shinbun as of October 22, Descente Ltd. change its business plan to open more golf ware shops in department stores in South Korea. It aimed to open one or two shops of Munsingwear and 10 to 15 stores of Le Coq Sportif Golf to bring at least 10 billion yen of annual sales in South Korea within four years, compared to sales of 6 billion yen in 2007.
Due to Korean won depreciation against Japanese yen and economic disorder, Descente Ltd. will scale down business operations: suspend any opening of Munsingwear stores and open only five stores of Le Coq Sportif Golf in FY2009.
]]>According to Gateway21’s lawyer, about ¥950 million in tuition and boarding fees paid by some 1,300 people who were planning to go overseas is unlikely to be recovered, even after bankruptcy procedures.
･43.6 percent of the respondents out of 984 would-be listed companies answered that they plans to be listed under their schedules. This is the first time the drop in percent has happened since the last four years.
･Only 9.5 percent of the respondents answered that the would-be listed companies want to be listed in stock exchanges in 2008 or 2009, dropping by 6.1 % from the last year research.
・391 respondents （39.7％） would select TSE Mothers as the most favorable stock exchange, followed by JASDAQ with 347 respondents (35.3％) and with 173 respondents (17.6％).
・Most of the respondents answered that they aims to be listed with a reason to increase name recognition and creditworthiness. It occurred 756 respondents of the would-be listed companies (76.8％) as well as 176 respondents of the newly listed companies (90.3％).
・Both respondents of the would-be listed companies and the newly listed companies agreed that it is the most challenging hurdle to establish an internal audit system and function the system. It occurred 639 respondents of would-be listed companies (64.9％) as well as 157 respondents of the newly listed companies (80.5％).
・Around 70 percent of the respondents considered that Japanese-version Sarbanes-Oxley Act (J-SOX) affects their IPO schedules to establish a viable internal audit system.
Designed to highlight the lush natural beauty of the area, Phase I of the Ho Tram Strip will be themed on the concept of environmental preservation and conservation. Nestled in a pristine and safe environment, will be two five-star hotels with a combined 2,300 luxurious rooms and suites, Vietnam’s first Las Vegas-style casino - featuring live entertainment stages and an exclusive VIP area to compliment a gaming floor consisting of more than 500 slot machines and approximately 90 table games.
Asian Coast Development Ltd.
I am wondering if casino market in Asia region is going to be crowded in couple of years later although time schedule of development and operation of Ho Tram Strip or the number of visitors given by a web site Ho Tram Strip is not clear at all.
Thus there are two big casino resort projects going on: Resorts World at Sentosa planned by Resorts World at Sentosa Pte Ltd in Singapore and Bagong Nayong Pilipino planned by Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation in the Philippines.
Resorts World at Sentosa will be open as a casino resort in spring 2010 and expects 15 million visitors annually. Genting International Plc whose subsidiary is Resorts World at Sentosa Pte Ltd has already secured $4.19 billion in syndicated funding that will pay for about two-thirds of the integrated resort in February 2008. It comprised $4 billion in loans and a $192.5 million banker’s guarantee facility from DBS Bank, OCBC Bank, HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation. 
Resorts World at Sentosa
Genting International Plc
A Manila bay integrated tourism project Bagong Nayong Pilipino also plans to open casino resort in 2010 and expects 3 million visitors annually. Bagong Nayong Pilipino was planned by a state casino firm Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation and four consortium members have started to finance each of facility developments in 2008.
Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation
In 2005, Asian casino kingdom Macao had 18.7 million visitors while it had 10 million visitors from Mainland China. Resorts World at Sentosa and Bagong Nayong Pilipino will try to attract those Chinese customers to new facilities because other possible visitors such as Japanese or Korean are less interested in gambling resorts than Chinese. Gambling resorts should share a pie of Chinese travelers basically although the number of Chinese travelers are uncertain.
| (Unit:Million yen) | Net sales | Operating profit | Net income |
| FY2008 | 21,444 | 5,172 | 1,512 |
| FY2009(est.) | 28,000 | 7,500 | 3,000 |
JAIC revised its original forecast into 20,700 million of Net sales, 5,900 million yen of Operating loss and 7,200 million of Net loss as of September 5th. The revision is attributed by a bankruptcy filing by Nissan Rinkai Construction Co. by which JAIC is likely to suffer about 6.2 billion yen in associated losses.
| (Unit:Million yen) | Net sales | Operating profit | Net income |
| FY2008 | 222,567 | 42,606 | 4,228 |
| FY2009(est.) | 200,000 | 33,000 | 21,000 |
Due to a bankruptcy filing by real estate firm Zephyr Co., SBI announced to book 9.469 billion yen as a special loss in FY 2009 as of July 30th. It should lower its full-year operating profit forecast substantially.
| (Unit:Million yen) | Net sales | Operating profit | Net income |
| FY2008 | 67,937 | 12,813 | 7,684 |
| FY2009(est.) | 36,000 | 11,000 | 7,700 |
| (Unit:Million yen) | Net sales | Operating profit | Net income |
| FY2008 | 19,876 | -13,732 | -5,485 |
| FY2009(est.) | 22,000 | 2,000 | 1,500 |
AirAsia
It is really good news for budget traveler like me! However, I am still wondering which city in Japan AirAsia will chose to connect to Kuala Lumpur because I am living in Tokyo. AirAsia seems to have two options in 2010; a route to Tokyo’s Haneda airport which is slated to be expanded or another route to a new airport in Ibaraki Prefecture.
Expansion of Haneda airport is under construction to build the 4th runway by 2010 which would add 40% of the number of departure and arrival to the current capacity of 239, 000 times a year as of October 2005.
Ibaraki airport aims to open by March 2010 as well. I believe that most of residents in Metro Tokyo prefer to what AirAsia decides to choose Haneda airport because Ibaraki airport is not conveniently located in terms of public transportation. It might take one hour to ride express train starting from Ueno station in Tokyo and further to take bus to reach airport.
The worst case scenario for residents in Tokyo is that AirAsia will choose the second biggest city Osaka or other big cities as well as Jetstar Airways Pty Ltd, part of Australia’s Qantas Airways Ltd. in Australia or Cebu Pacific Air in the Philippines.
Both budget airlines, Jetstar and Cebu Pacific Air, started their flights to Osaka in August 2007 and in November 2008, respectively. Osaka is the second largest city having 8 million of population in Japan but there is no benefit for both airlines operating in Osaka, except reducing landing costs for departure and arrival.
Budget airline is relatively new for Japanese travelers who are still afraid of its safety. If budget airline wants to change mindset of those travelers, it could start its business in Tokyo where it is a center of broadcast marketing and buzz marketing to increase brand recognition.
