"When you are the first one to get hold of a new gadget, it's important that people around you already know a little bit about the product and can recognize it, " said Toshiyuki Ueno, an engineer and technology consultant, who got an iPad last month in the U.S. and has a reservation to buy a 3G version in Japan.

WSJ: Japan's iPad Frenzy Signals a Sea Change

The U.S.' and most of the world's economies have been suffering from a mild version of what Japan has been going through for more than a decade.

FORBES: Fact and Comment

Brazil, with its historical ties to Japan, has adopted a version of the 1seg system.

ECONOMIST: America is finally poised to get mobile television

Digit Wireless has also developed a version for Japan that allows the keyboard to represent the 120 characters of the country's languages.

BBC: Mobile keypad reinvented

The fund has gained a 19.7% compound annualized return since its inception in June 1998, compared with 6.6% for a hedged version of Japan's topix index.

FORBES: Unsung outperformers

Keidanren, Japan's business lobby, recently floated a less ambitious version of the idea.

ECONOMIST: Japan's disaster and business reform

The team's two drivers, Takuma Sato of Japan and Britain's Anthony Davidson, drove a hybrid version of their 2007 car with several technical improvements last month.

CNN: Magma Group come to aid of Super Aguri

Thanks to high fixed commissions and little interest in building wealth for investors, customers were encouraged to buy and sell shares and investment trusts, Japan's version of mutual funds, as often as possible (a practice known as churning).

ECONOMIST: Japanese finance

But Januvia isn't just a newer version of existing diabetes blockbusters like Avandia, from GlaxoSmithKline, and Actos, from Japan's Takeda Pharmaceutical .

FORBES: Magazine Article

The eight chapters in the free version included an introduction to hiragana, chapters on greetings and a cultural interlude on the geography of Japan.

WSJ: Mobile Apps for Foreign Languages