Akio Morita, co-founder of the Sony Corporation who has died aged 78, was best known outside Japan as the man who gave the world the Walkman. But that reputation massively understates the achievements of a business visionary who transformed a small electronic repair company into a global multi-media giant - and became, arguably, the most influential Japanese of his generation.
Born the eldest son of a wealthy merchant in Nagoya, central Japan, he was expected to inherit his father's sake and soy sauce business.
As a boy, however, he preferred to tinker with the family's new phonograph rather than learn about brewing techniques. His fascination with electronics took him to Osaka Imperial University, where he took a degree in physics - rather than economics, as his father had suggested.
It was whilst doing war-time research on missile systems that he met Masaru Ibuka, whose dreamy technical genius was to provide the perfect complement to his sharp business acumen. Their relationship, Ibuka's wife would later say, was "closer than lovers".
In 1946, amid the rubble of post-war Tokyo, the two men established a small electronics company with 20 employees and a small amount of capital. The early days were tough and the business was only able to stay afloat with income from radio repairs and loans from Akio Morita's father. The big breakthrough came in 1950, when the company developed Japan's first tape recorder.
After that there was no stopping them. As Ibuka pioneered new devices - such as the world's first pocket-sized radio and the Trinitron TV - Akio Morita used his charisma and canny business sense to promote the company's image overseas.
His masterstroke came in 1958, when he changed the company's name from Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo (Tokyo Telecommunications and Engineering Industries) to Sony - a mixture of sonus, the Latin word for sound, and "sonny boy", which he felt epitomised youthful vitality.
In the 1950s, he made hundreds of visits to the US to check the latest technological developments and to explore potential markets. It was not always a gratifying experience: because of currency restrictions he only had enough money to stay in cheap hotels, and often had to do his own washing in the sink. He was also embarrassed that Japanese products were seen as cheap and shoddy - a reputation he vowed to change.
The biggest step towards that came in 1961 when Sony became the first foreign company to sell shares on the New York Stock Exchange. This issue raised $3 million, but, more significantly, it lifted the profile of Sony in the US. Akio Morita would say later it was the happiest moment of his career.
In 1974, as president of Sony, he led the influx of Japanese companies into Britain by establishing a television manufacturing plant in Bridgend in Wales.
The location was reportedly decided at a meeting four years earlier with Prince Charles. By the time Akio Morita was knighted in 1993, Britain had attracted more than 40 per cent of Japanese investment in Europe.
He was a businessman who relied on instinct. This meant some huge successes, such as the decision to push ahead with the Walkman in the 1980s despite doubts about how it would be received. But there were also failures, notably the disastrous move to challenge the leading VHS video format with Beta.
He was also outspoken and stirred up controversy in 1989 by co-authoring a book, The Japan That Can Say No, with the nationalist Shintaro Ishihara.
But his frank and witty criticism of American business practices was also applauded as a refreshing change from the bland comments of successive Japanese prime ministers and bureaucrats. Henry Kissinger said that he was probably the single most effective Japanese spokesman he ever met.
Usually a man of boundless energy - he took up scuba diving and water-skiing in his 60s - he suffered a stroke in 1993 which left him wheelchair-bound. He retired as Sony chairman a year later and spent most of the rest of his life in Hawaii.
He is survived by his wife Yoshiko, sons Hideo and Masao and daughter Naoko.
Akio Morita: born 1921; died October, 1999