Structural source enabling firm revitalization innovation of sector—An empirical analysis of Japanese 31 industrial Sectors

During the “lost decade” of the 1990s, a significant number of Japanese sectors experienced critical business circumstances. However, by adopting a variety of strict disciplinary measures, a number of these sectors have been able to reconstruct their operations, and several of them were able to revitalize themselves since 2004.This paper attempts to empirically analyze and identify the structural sources that have enabled sectors to succeed in their revitalization efforts.First of all, on the basis of a comprehensive review of Japan's 31 sectors over the last 13 years, this paper demonstrates that the structure which includes many strategy paths to activate sectors is useful for the firm revitalization innovation at the sector level (FRI-s). In Japan, it was especially verified that three independent strategies contributed to FRI-s.Second, by examining the empirical rate of FRI-s, this paper demonstrates that the high possibility of FRI-s strengthens the revitalization structure of a sector.Finally, it could be assumed the existence of a circulation mechanism at three layers (a national level strategy, a firm level strategy, and a sector level accumulation) in the revitalization structure.