By Karen E. Thuermer, AJOTLike cherry blossoms that symbolize springtime and renewal, Japan is emerging from its near 17-year economic slump. Despite the recent slowdown, Japan boasts the largest and most diverse economy in Asia, and is second only to the United States on the world’s economic stage. Only the United States has a higher gross national product (GNP). The United States sends more exports to Japan than it does to any other overseas destination beyond North America. Impacting that effort are the thousands of US companies that have established successful operations in Japan with the assistance of the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO). US presenceAtrenta, a San Jose, CA-based provider of software used to design computer chips, offers a good example. Japan’s electronic design automation (EDA) market represents a substantial portion of the total global market. Atrenta executives believe that in order to grow its business the company needed a presence in Japan. “To ignore Japan is to ignore 25% of the market,” says Bill Baker, Asia general manager for Atrenta. Atrenta also needed an office in Japan to directly support multi-national customers such as Texas Instruments, which has large operations in Japan. “We need to be on the ground in these areas so that we can provide them the highest level of support,” says Baker. “Having direct operations in Japan is a very key part of our overall customer strategy.” Before establishing their Japan subsidiary, Atrenta worked through the Japanese distributor Zuken. “They did an excellent job in terms of establishing a base upon which to build,” Baker says. “But we later became large enough to fund our own operation and needed to demonstrate commitment to our Japanese customers and to the Japanese market.” After consulting with JETRO, Atrenta established a subsidiary in 2005, a move that more than doubled its sales in 2006. Likewise, Pelican Products, a Torrance, CA manufacturer and worldwide exporter of injection-molded plastic cases and ATEX-certified flashlights, also benefits from its presence in Japan. Prior to opening an office there, Pelican’s export sales were approaching 30% of its total business, but exports to Japan made up only four percent. Pelican saw significant potential for growth in Japan due to the presence of hazardous locations and the safety requirements for equipment used in such environments. Pelican’s cases range in size from as small as cell phones to as large as steamer trunks. They are specially designed for transporting sensitive electronics and other high-value equipment that require airtight, watertight, dust-proof and impact-resistant protection. Its flashlights, like other electrical equipment used in hazardous locations, are safety-approved to resist setting off a spark that could cause an explosion in gas-filled environments like mines, refineries, and chemical sites. “We felt from a commercial standpoint that Japan was the next best opportunity for us in terms of putting resources and growing our sales as a company overall,” says John Padian, Pelican Products chief operations officer. Since establishing an office in Japan in October 2004, Pelican Products Japan has doubled their number of distributors. Market opportunitiesChanges brought through technology and the Internet, restructuring within the Japanese economy and bilateral negotiations have opened the Japanese market in many sectors where US companies are globally competitive - telecommunications, medical equipment and pharmaceuticals, energy (including power generation and transmission equipment), information technology, insurance, and financial services. The Economic Partnership for Growth, launched by President Bush and Prime Minister Koizumi in June 2001, has also resulted in the US and Japanese governments continuing to exchange reform recommendations on key sectors every Fall. As a consequence, US exports to Japan have risen steadily over the last several years, and