In this paper, we investigated and compared the strategy and governance of Technology-based Small Firms (TBSFs) between Japan and the US. The TBSFs in Japan were selected from SMEs which were certified by the government program of “Temporary Law Concerning Measures for the Promotion of the Creative Business Activities of Small and Medium Enterprises.” The TBSFs in the US were selected from the SMEs which received the Ben Franklin Technology Partners program in Pennsylvania. Based upon the data collected from the mail survey conducted between 2002 and 2004, the following explorative results were found. There is no difference of strategy between family business and non-family business both in Japan and the US. The visionary leadership of top management was stronger in Japan. The capital ratio by family members is higher for the successor-managed firms in the US. There is statistically significant difference of strategy and top management between the founder-managed firms and the successor-managed firms in Japan. The high performance TBSFs both in Japan and the US are likely to take the prospective strategy. However, TBSFs in Japan are more prospective and keep variety of technological resources and cost advantages. TBSFs in the US seek for niche market strategy. Regarding the characteristics of top management of the high performance TBSFs, the visionary leadership was strong in Japan and the analytical behavior based upon the industrial knowledge was emphasized in the US.

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This paper examines the survival factors of new business developing SMEs in Japan. Based upon the data collected from 1233 responses to a nation-wide mail and telephone surveys of these firms in Japan, it is found that there were seven determinant survival factors. Among these, well-understanding of business community, no cost-based strategy and resource or knowledge based strategy were common key factors. There were two determinant survival factors for the young SMEs: Proactive behavior such as quick market penetration and introduction of new products and services, and the innovativeness. For the growing SMEs, there were seven determinant survival factors. Among these, the resource or knowledge based strategy and low risk market positioning were found as key factors. The common survival factor for young, growing and all sample firms is related to interaction with their customers.

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The improving a disparity in economic power between local and urban society is one of the crucial problems of which our country should wrestle with. The many kind of measures for improving local economy has been attempted after the war in order to realize “well-balanced and advanced country”, but obviously there remained “the districts left behind” where the measures did not work effectively like an image. “The districts left behind” located in remote from metropolitan area like Kochi (equal Akita, Aomori, Tokushima, Kagoshima, Wakayama, Shimane, Iwate, Nagasaki, Miyazaki) have been tried to find the measures of improving a disparity, while a further shift to global economy and financial reconstruction go. However, even in economic recovery situation after 2002, they have a hard time to reach discovery of effective measures of improving a disparity. The main point of this article is as follows. ①Investigation of the reason why “the districts left behind” were not able to establish autonomous economy. ②Submit methodology of establishing the autonomous local economy that paid its attention to locally possessed resources. ③Apply the methodology to Kochi that is one of the typical model of “the districts left behind”. ④Paying its attention to forest resources as the managerial resources that Kochi possesses, and consider management innovation of the timber business company being managed substantially, and examine possibility of the improving a disparity in economic power between local and urban society by establishing autonomous economy through vitalizing timber industries. ⑤Paying our attention to that most of “the districts left behind” have an abundant forest resource, and insist on the methodology that this article raised being effective as the measure of improving a disparity in economic power between local and urban society. As a result of above-mentioned consideration, I hope to increase the employment and GDP of a district by timber industry activation and want to contribute improving a disparity in economic power between local and urban society.

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The promotion of entrepreneuring by a joint venture making by the use of human resources is expected by Act on Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) enforced in August, 2005. In this research, the technology transfer process by LLP system is analyzed by using the case data, and the new perspective of the technology transfer is presented. As a result, the following points were clarified. In technical LLP, the middle stage technology at practical use is a core of development. LLP is established for development of the application and the usage and commercialization. The value chain is constructed through the joint development dividing the work between the industry-university. The complexities and the numbers of alliances are not higher than high-tech fields.

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We analyzed corporate venture capital (CVC) activities of Japanese corporations through the case studies of six major electronics companies. Most of them emphasize strategic return rather than financial return as a mission of CVC. Those who want CVC to be a technology window tend to invest through external venture capital funds and those who seek for more direct contribution to its business would prefer having internal direct investment functions, but the direct investment usually can also provide window functions. Continuity of the CVC operations, which is often regarded as one of the common weaknesses of CVC, is also a problem in Japanese corporate, but when a CVC is structured to seek for strategic purpose on the condition of recouping investments, CVC is an effective way of incorporating external technologies into new businesses for corporations.

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This is a case study about an IS (information system) procurement model adopted by a local government exceptionally. This model that we call ‘modular-order co-development model’ is that the local government divides a set of IS development work into small tasks and procures them from multiple software firms respectively, and the firms develop the IS collaboratively. It is one of procurement models designed to contribute to foster the local software industry through providing the tasks for the firms most of which are small. The results indicate that the model is likely to be effective to build interfirm network among the firms. For small firms that have slight ability alone, it is beneficial to build cooperative network to complement their resources one another.

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