Mouli Cohen on the Economy

Overseas Markets Stunted by Unhealthy Competition?

In the not-so-distant past, it was unthinkable to imagine a middle-class home without a Sony consumer electronic product, be it a Sony Walkman, a Sony Ericsson phone or a flat-screen television. But today, many of these products are being replaced, not by other Japanese brands like Panasonic, Toshiba or even Sharp, but by their once-underdog South Korean counterparts LG and Samsung.

Samsung Electronics was once known as 'the poor man's Sony' but this was far from the minds of electronics enthusiasts at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES), recently held in Las Vegas where Samsung competed on a level playing field with both Sony, and rival South Korean electronics giant, LG, for the attention of 3D television skeptics.

What may have been going through their minds is the fact that it was Samsung, and not Sony, that had recently emerged as the world's biggest flat-screen television producer. But this is only one example of Samsung overtaking Sony, and others are not too hard to find.

Without naming any of the above-mentioned brands in particular, some say that the Japanese are retaliating by throwing technology patents at the South Koreans. Instead of focusing their time, money and effort in coming up with new technology for better products, some companies have long since fallen back on the practice of broadening and specifying the patent specifications that they own so that other manufacturers are not able to take over their markets. In effect, many businesses are just not able to develop and build on past technologies, and instead, develop other technologies to do the exact same thing.

The US did it to Japan after WWII, Japan is doing it to Korea now, and some day Korea may just do it to China as well. All of this serves to give justification to the infamous adage that says, 'If you can't innovate, litigate.'

About Mouli Cohen

Mouli Cohen As an entrepreneur in many industries, Mouli Cohen is able to share insightful opinions on topics ranging from technology to start-up businesses, to overseas markets and even art. Cohen has founded and developed start-up companies that have generated over $3B in shareholder value. He is also a generous philanthropist, not just in a financial sense, but also in his efforts to help others give as well.