Report from Gadgetland

It's the Mecca of tech in all its burnished, miniaturized glory. Cute little cars, cameras, watches, mobile phones and robotic pets. Yet only a handful of companies in Japan are applying their ingenuity in technology to investor relations Out of 3,566 listed companies as of August 2001, the first Japanese IR web ranking by Nikkei Business found 3,291 with web sites but only 552 with investor relations information on them. Nomura IR, the country's largest IR service provider, did 741 webcasts