Nearly a quarter century ago, Japanese industry went into a tailspin. The Nikkei now trades roughly where it did in November 1984 when the Dow was at 1,200 and at a fifth of its peak at the close of 1989. In what is the greatest stock market collapse in history, Japanese equity markets have been wiped out. Once-great Japanese export powerhouses that led their industries in innovation are today awash in losses and stagger under collapses of market share as innovators from elsewhere pass them by. Many have earnings that have not recovered R&D expenses in decades. Whole families of products that Japan once dominated like video and still cameras, music players, game consoles, and cell phones have dissolved into non-Japanese products like Apple’s iPhone, leaving Japanese producers with nothing to sell in foreign markets and, more of a problem, no one to whom to sellJapanese suppliers routinely lose to faster-moving competitors whose products may not be as good