Here's A Pc For Peanuts

Shrewdly, IBM then invited other computer makers to join a group with which it would share its multilingual system. If enough signed up, a second standard-in competition with NEC-would emerge in Japan, making it easier to recruit large distributors and retailers. IBM says 25 companies signed on. That includes powerful Fujitsu Ltd., the huge Japanese mainframe maker that lags well behind NEC in its home market in PCS.

Hot prices:

Not to be outdone, IBM rival Apple Computer also boosted its sales sharply in Japan last year, a period in which PC sales declined. With its historic antagonism toward an IBM-driven world, Apple in a way resembles NEC. But the comparison is misleading. Apple products, particularly the Macintosh, with its slick graphic capabilities, are hot right now in Japan, particularly among the young. Nor did Apple freeze when Compaq started a price war. They slashed prices too. "Apple had the most successful year last year of any of us," says Compaq's Murai.

Despite the U.S. momentum, NEC still retains huge advantages in Japan-most prominently a distribution and retail network that's vaster than all the Americans' combined. Even so, with Dell at the ready to make things even more competitive, industry analyst Darrel E. Whitten believes the U.S. companies may grab 30 percent of the Japanese market within five years, more than twice their level at the beginning of the decade. Who will the ultimate winner be? That's already clear. It's Yukio Sakamoto, who, peering at a Compaq display in central Tokyo recently, said, "I didn't think I'd ever see computers this cheap in Japan." Sakamoto wins-and so does anyone else in the market for a PC in Japan.

© 1993