How Japan Held Korea’s Chip Factories Hostage

What happened to Japanese electronics? In 2019, a country everyone said had lost the industry supplied about 92% of South Korea's imported photoresist and used it as a lever against Samsung's home country. Sony, Panasonic, Sharp and Toshiba once ruled living rooms. Today Foxconn owns Sharp, and the two largest sellers of the memory Toshiba invented are Korean. The obvious answer is that Japanese electronics died. But open a modern phone or processor and a different picture appears: the silicon wafer, the photoresist, the coating machines, the test equipment — and a chip-packaging film made by the company that invented MSG. This video follows where Japan's electronics industry actually went, why its manufacturing system suited that place better, and what happened the one time Japan pulled the lever. Questions this video answers: What happened to Japanese electronics? Why did Foxconn buy Sharp? Why did Japanese electronics companies fail? What is Galápagos syndrome in Japanese phones? What does Japan make for semiconductors? Why does Ajinomoto make chip materials? Why did Japan restrict exports to South Korea in 2019? Did Japan's export controls hurt Samsung? Is Japan still important in the chip industry? Chapters 0:00 Japan’s three-chemical weapon 1:24 What happened to Japanese electronics? 3:29 Why did Japanese electronics companies fail? 6:31 What does Japan make inside your phone? 8:29 Why does Japan win at chip materials? 10:57 Did Japan's export controls work? 13:00 Did Japan really lose electronics? 14:59 What happens when a chokepoint is used? 17:20 Is Japan still powerful in electronics? Sources Brookings, "The renaissance of the Japanese semiconductor industry" (2024): https://www.brookings.edu/articles/th... AMRO, Annual Consultation Report — Japan 2024, Selected Issue 5: https://amro-asia.org/wp-content/uplo... Makioka & Zhang, export controls and the Japan–Korea dispute (CEPR/RIETI): https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/impact... USITC working paper, the South Korea–Japan trade dispute in context: https://www.usitc.gov/publications/33... Business and Politics (Cambridge), South Korea–Japan dispute over materials, parts and equipment: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journa... NBR, "Bolstering and Securing Semiconductor Supply Chains": https://nbr.org/publication/bolsterin... Japan Investment Corporation, JSR tender offer results (2024): https://www.jiccapital.co.jp/en/news/... Ajinomoto Fine-Techno, Ajinomoto Build-up Film: https://www.aft-website.com/en/produc... TrendForce, NAND Flash supplier revenue 4Q25: https://www.trendforce.com/presscente... IEEE Spectrum, Chip Hall of Fame: Toshiba NAND flash: https://spectrum.ieee.org/chip-hall-o... AP via CBC, Foxconn to take over Sharp (2016): https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/foxc... Bloomberg, Japan ends chip-material export curbs on South Korea (2023): https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articl... Did Japan make the smarter trade giving up the famous brands for parts nobody else can make or did it retreat into a smaller slice of the pie? Tell us in the comments.