Why Japan Matters: iPad Mania, Cloud Computing, And Social Intelligence

Editor's note : Marc Benioff , chairman and CEO of salesforce.com , really loves Japan. And if you are a startup founder or tech executive, he thinks you should too. He explains why in this guest post, culled from observations from his most recent visit. Thousands of people lined up last week to buy iPads. And, if you didn't notice them, it’s because they were in Tokyo. I’ve been living in Japan for the past three weeks and couldn’t miss the madness around the introduction of the iPad here. I couldn't believe the demand for this new “magical” computer. After all, this is the country that developed and built some of the world’s most popular PCs—and now the iPad, which was designed somewhere else, is revered. It’s bowed to. (Reportedly, about half of Japanese business and technology magazines are featuring the iPad on their covers.) I expect that out of the 10 million iPads sold this year, at least 500,000 to one million will be sold in Japan. Something else amazing in Apple-mania happened last week. Apple’s market cap passed Microsoft . I suggested in a post last April, "The end of Microsoft. A door opens to a new cloud" , that this seminal event was about to happen. Steve Jobs described it as being “Surreal”. I agree. It is surreal—both unbelievable and fantastic. This is a milestone that signifies a dramatic change of computing: Windows is on the decline, and new technologies such as iPads and iPhones, Android and Google Search, and Cloud Computing are on the way up.