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Why So Many of the World’s Oldest Companies Are in Japan

Our ideal outcome as a company is not becoming the next Facebook (god forbid), it’s becoming the next Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan, a hot spring hotel in Japan, and one of the world’s oldest businesses (founded in 705 AD).
Yoshinori Hara, dean and professor at Kyoto University’s Graduate School of Management, says these long-standing entities, at least 100 years old, are known as ‘shinise’ – literally meaning ‘old shop’.
Hara, who worked in Silicon Valley for a decade, says that Japanese companies’ emphasis on sustainability, rather than quick ma... See more
Howard Schultz • Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built a Company One Cup at a Time
As I mentioned, most of the oldest companies in the world are in Japan. In a survey of 5,500 companies over 200 years old, 3,100 are based in Japan. The rest are in some of the older countries in Europe.
But — and this was a fact I found curious, and one that speaks to the cyclical nature of things — 90% of the companies that are over 200 years old
... See moreAlexander Rose • The Data of Long-Lived Institutions
Japan is known the world over for pioneering many technological innovations. This daring attitude is and isn’t part of the web culture. Japan has some really unique services for consumers like the one’s I’ve mentioned, and websites sprung up to help make the eCommerce transition smooth. So smooth that in 2013 Japan ranked #2 on the G
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