FOREWORD

Small and Medium Enterprises or SMEs feature prominently in the APO member countries. They constitute the largest economic and business entities and assume a major role in employment generation. As such, many member countries place great importance on the development of the competitiveness of SMEs so that they can serve as the engine of growth for national economies.

In the global economy, companies must enhance their capacity for technology development and innovation, thereby, enabling the continuous creation of additional customer value. For that reason, many Japanese enterprises have introduced the management of technology to utilize the results of advances in technology in the most productive manner to offer more competitive products and services. The management of technology aims to maximize the cost-effectiveness of investments in technology development and ultimately contribute to enterprise value.

The APO Top Management Forum 2007 was organized in collaboration with the Japan Productivity Center for Socio-Economic Development (JPC-SED) and gathered 35 overseas participants from 18 APO member countries, as well as 20 local participants. The forum focused on the strategic management of technology. A wealth of information on the topic was offered by the distinguished speakers, and I would like to express my deep gratitude to them for sharing their knowledge and experience. Thanks to their insightful presentations, the participants had opportunities to examine the Japanese experience and best practices of the management of technology in enterprises, covering support from the government, creating leadership and an organizational culture, and human resources development to promote technology development and innovation. I hope that the participants will adapt the insights gained to enhance systems to manage technology and innovation in their own countries.

I also would like to express sincere gratitude to the Japanese government for financial support and to the JPC-SED for its assistance in organizing the forum.

This publication contains summaries of the presentations as well as a strategic paper on the management of technology and is intended to help the readers to review the topics covered in the APO Top Management Forum 2007. I hope that this volume is seen as useful to those involved in creating new concepts of how businesses can foster innovation to achieve sustainable growth in the Asia-Pacific region.

Shigeo Takenaka, Secretary-General, Tokyo
December 2007