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Stefan Jacoby has been President and Chief Executive Officer of Mitsubishi Europe since October 2001 when he joined the company to initiate and manage its turnaround in Europe. Before joining Mitsubishi Motors Europe Mr. Jacoby had a 16‐year career with VW Group. His last assignment within the VW Group was as Vice‐president for the Asia‐Pacific region in 1997, and was in charge of sales, marketing, finance and production and achieved considerable development in the region by increasing sales volume by 10 percent per year. In this interview Mr. Jacoby talks about the difficulties he initially faced at Mitsubishi and the strategies he employed to bring people on board and ultimately turn the business around.

Investigates the differences in protocols between arbitral tribunals and courts, with particular emphasis on US, Greek and English law. Gives examples of each country and its way of using the law in specific circumstances, and shows the variations therein. Sums up that arbitration is much the better way to gok as it avoids delays and expenses, plus the vexation/frustration of normal litigation. Concludes that the US and Greek constitutions and common law tradition in England appear to allow involved parties to choose their own judge, who can thus be an arbitrator. Discusses e‐commerce and speculates on this for the future.

Japan's robot manufacturers are beginning to cast their eyes towards Europe. A number of tie ups with European companies have recently been announced.

In Japan a network system called keiretsu exists (Abegglen & Stalk, 1985; Gerlach, 1992; Sheard, 1994). Keiretsu may involve formal and informal relationships with suppliers that have developed over the years or other interfirm links (for example, among manufacturers and supporting financial institutions). In the late 1990s, the Japanese economic system has undergone some changes such as the dissolution of cross-shareholdings and the decline of the main bank system (relationship-based financing) leading to changes in the corporate ownership and the governance system of Japanese companies.

Merger and acquisition (M&A) is a way to survive and succeed in a competitive global environment as a consequence of new political, monetary and regulatory issues. The complex phenomenon that M&As represent has received consistent attention from the research community over the last 30 years.

M&As are a strategic choice to grow quicker, enter new markets and maximize companies' capabilities, which otherwise would not have been possible. Within the automotive industry, this phenomenon has been seen repeatedly with examples like Mitsubishi-Daimler, Jaguar-Ford, Daimler-Chrysler, Seat-Volkswagen, Daewoo-General Motors and Land Rover-Ford. Although M&A activity has trended directionally consistent with automotive assembly volume, there are some failure cases within automotive industry M&As (e.g., Rover-BMW). In this chapter, the focus is on the intercultural issues of the M&A phenomenon. The underestimation of the cultural factors has significant impact on why M&A operations sometimes fail to achieve the predefined goals.

It is of vital importance for the automotive companies to understand and be aware of these intercultural issues in order to be successful in their merger or acquisition.

The phenomenon of M&A within the automotive industry needs further research and discussions due to the fact that some strategic alliances and M&A proved to be successful (e.g., Škoda-Volkswagen) and others not (e.g., Rover-BMW).

By the year 2000, will there be one major global multinational automobile company supplying the entire planet? Extrapolating from trends in the 1980s, it is entirely possible to speculate that one major company—having swallowed up the entire global competition, with all the attendant benefits of economies of size and scale, high R&D expenditures, with adaptations of its products and prices to local market needs on a continent‐wide basis—will produce cars that consumers everywhere will buy. Should this occur, the next question we need to ask is: Will this company have its headquarters in Japan, the United States, or Europe? Again, if you were to follow the trends in the media, you would forecast a high probability that the “One Big Auto” company will be Japanese. However, my research suggests a somewhat different scenario for the future. While there will be a concentration in the industry worldwide, and fewer, larger companies will dominate the industry, there have been many unanticipated developments. Principal among these is the persistence of many companies in the industry, which are increasingly interlocked through joint ventures, so that it is no longer relevant to think of an American, European, or Japanese car. Rather, the final product is sourced from dozens of different countries.

The Korean auto industry of less than ten years ago was quite different from today. Then it relied heavily on technology and one company, selling one model in one export market. Today, the market concentration strategy has been abandoned and the international business strategy is in a period of transition. Once overlooked, Europe is now a priority market. Explains why and considers the implications.