A Vendor's View of Japanese Networking
Bay Networks' PR department manager, Toshiaki Ebata, offers some thoughts about the future of Japan's networking market.
by Wm. Auckerman
Bay Networks, Inc., was the global leader in the 1995 LAN management software market. According to market researcher International Data Corporation, Bay Networks' Optivity network management applications captured a 51% worldwide market share for Windows-based LAN management software (up sharply from its 35% market share in 1994), while its high-end, UNIX-based LAN management offerings held an industry-leading 38% share of shipments.
The company's Japan office, Bay Networks KK, has enjoyed great success as well. In late March, Bay Networks KK moved into new offices, in the Shiroyama JT Mori Building near Kamiyacho station. The main reason for the move was to improve communication with customers and potential customers by providing space for a seminar room and a state-of-the-art networking "showroom" of how specific products can be used in an office environment.
With revenues expected to surpass ¥14 billion this year, Bay Networks KK covers the entire networking market, from the low-end, cost-conscious SOHO [small office/home office] sector through to the technologically demanding, high-end enterprise market. We visited Bay Networks' new offices to ask Toshiaki Ebata, manager of the public relations department, his views of Japanese networking.
While agreeing with the common perception that Japan is about five years behind the US in networking, Ebata feels this is changing. Today's highly competitive corporate environment, he says, demands that individual productivity be enhanced, which means adequately computerizing the office. And networking will follow close on the heels of computerization.
The traditional large enterprise has been losing ground, he says, to smaller, more efficient operations. Small companies with specific specialty areas are now joining forces to work on large projects, coming together as a cooperative group to do what the enterprise used to do. And even within the enterprise, large organizations are being split into smaller divisions, such as workgroups. In both of these paradigms, where efficient work sharing is essential, networking is a must.
Japan might catch up to where the US is now in another 3 to 5 years, but progress in the US is not standing still, Ebata warns. By that time, networking in the West will have advanced even further. Whether Japan can ever truly catch up with, let alone surpass the US in networking, is questionable.
Ebata notes that the general absence of CIOs (chief information officers) in Japan has been a hindrance. But he feels that the need for CIO-type authority is quickly being recognized. As intranets and corporate connections to the Internet increase and bring about de facto "open" computing, there are greater security risks and more intensive management needs. Establishing proper management and security systems will be an important role for Japan's new CIOs, Ebata feels.
Asked if the requirements of localization are a hindrance to the networking and groupware software markets in Japan, Ebata says that this is not a problem at the technical level. The real problem, he suggests, is at the "standardization" level; something as simple as changing from the letter-size paper standard in US software to A4 paper for Japan and Europe can create headaches. What is needed in the future, he stresses, is not just localization of existing software, but true globalization from the development stage.
Ebata acknowledges that getting adequate support can be a problem for network users in Japan. The typical end user, though, tends to look at networking from a computer perspective, he pleads, and expects the network vendor to support the entire office computer system, which is a difficult task. Often the problem is one related to the computer systems rather than the network connections. Unlike some other vendors, Bay Networks deals with this problem by working with distributors who can properly support the computer systems side of the equation.
What is the near-term future of the Japanese networking market? Ebata sees three major trends: a shift to 100M-bps Ethernet, more attention to proper system management for large networks, and an increased adoption of networking within the SOHO environment. ATM (asynchronous transfer mode) technology has many merits, he acknowledges, especially for backbone applications, but there are still too many problems since most existing software was not developed with the demands and needs of ATM in mind. For end users, Ethernet will remain the technology of choice for the next several years.
http://www.baynetworks.com/
Bay Networks K.K.
Sohgo Hanzomon Bldg. 9F
1-7 Kojimachi,
Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102
Japan
Tel: 81-3-3288-0052
Fax: 81-3-3288-0179