“I need to accomplish new things all the time, so my life is a continuous trial and error,” says Karl Hahne, president and representative director of Häfele Japan. “I cannot sit still. I need to find new stuff [to do]. ...

Just before moving to Japan from Singapore in 2013 to take up the position of Representative Director for Diageo Japan, Johanna Honeyfield was asked to go in for a routine medical check-up. When one of the tests came back ...

Although half of Jean-Louis Moraud’s 40-year career at the electrical systems company Thales has been spent away from home — he has lived in Germany, Canada, South Africa, Taiwan and, now, Japan — “my heart is still in the south of France,” he confesses.

France is known for its rich food, historic landmarks, and influential culture; but the country is not so well known for its karate dojos or its Muay Thai boxing gyms. For Airbus Japan’s Frank Bignone, originally from Nice ...

“Uruguay is a unique country,” says Fernando Iglesias, president of Clestra Hauserman Japan. “It’s one of the smallest in South America. The population is only 3.4 million — some neighbourhoods in Tokyo have more people than that.”

Lourdes, in the foothills of the Pyrenees in southwest France, is a small town of just 15,000 people, but it draws six million visitors annually. Since the mid-19th century — when a girl named Bernadette Soubirous saw numerous ...

“I read novels by Japanese authors when I was a teenager,” says Pierre-Antoine Guillon, Japan representative and Asia Pacific sales manager at Kerneos. “The atmosphere and the themes in them were quite different from what I read in French novels.”

“Without change, we would never achieve anything,” says Peter Kronschnabl, CEO of BMW Group Japan. “Maintaining the present will always lead, at a certain point in time, to mediocrity.”

It’s estimated that by 2050 there will be more than 1.5 billion people over 65 years old on the planet. Today, in Japan — with its ongoing low birth rate — the issue of the ageing society is particularly pronounced.

“In a way, business is all about pricing,” says Pawel Komender, founder of PJK Strategy and Marketing Specialists. “Companies need to manage their prices wisely to stay profitable.”

India’s festival of colour, Holi, is a vibrant celebration of good over evil, where people throw coloured powder and spray water at one another. With its origins in the Hindu legend of the god Vishnu defeating the demoness Holika ...

In northern Sweden, there is a small town called Lycksele that is frequently treated to the dazzling light shows of the Aurora Borealis. Leif Nilsson, general manager for Asia–Pacific at Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) ...

The great blues, jazz and rock guitarists, such as Albert King, Wes Montgomery and Prince, make their instruments sing — and make it look effortless. When he was in his teens, Antoine Bourgeois, today president of Clarins Japan, wanted to know what made these musicians’ songs so good.

Picture a sunny, cloudless day at the beach with a steady breeze blowing along the shore and waves rolling across the water. These are the ideal conditions for kiteboarding, a water sport in which you are harnessed to a kite and pulled along on a small surfboard by the wind.

It’s been easy to feel down this year. Many of the things that make us happy — such as trips, festivals, and parties — had to be cancelled because of the coronavirus pandemic.