I was good at thinking logically and could quickly solve logic quizzes since childhood. I majored in mathematics at university, where I met a very good teacher. He used to say, “This is interesting” for everything. Whenever I heard that, I wondered whether those were really interesting. But when I tried them out, they sure turned out to be interesting. Since then, I have retained an attitude of finding something interesting in everything.
After graduating from graduate school, I joined Toray Industries, Inc. and was engaged in system-related work, developing systems for clients. I could make clients happy through the cycle of receiving an order, completing a system, delivering it, and receiving its payment, which also leads to the next project. I enjoyed it a lot and even thought that pursuing this path as a company employee may not be a bad idea.
Around the time of the birth of my first child, my father came down with an illness. That was when I felt that I had reached the halfway point of my life and did some self-reflection. Moreover, when I was working as the leader of a project to rebuild a core system, a sales executive said to me, “The system division just has to make what we tell you to make.” We were generating solid profits and contributing to the company’s business, so we did not deserve to be told something like that, which provided me with an impetus. I came to the realization that, after all, I want to make people happy through business, which was why I decided to start a business.

We were engaged in software development for a while from the time of establishment. From around 2008, we considered betting on the potential of smartphones and made our foray into this field, but our business performance continued to be hard. We were trying out various things in a bid to break the status quo. As part of that, we met with officials from many VCs, but nothing panned out because we did not have the knowledge or the information as to what it means to have someone invest in us, and we were fumbling.
Around this time, while this situation continued, our CFO introduced us to Mr. Sato of MUCAP. My image of venture capitalists based on my experience was that they were slightly scary, but Mr. Sato empathically listened to us from the beginning. While seeking his advice about various matters, he told us that MUCAP would participate in our first fundraising.
I actually do not remember much about that time. To be honest, I had no time to spare. We were able to raise funds, but it felt as if we were entrusted with money that belonged to someone else. However, various things started falling into place a month or two after our fundraising, like a financial institution offering us a loan and so on. Our proposals to clients also started getting accepted, maybe because we began to have some leeway. Looking back, the tide definitely turned with this fundraising.

So far, we have been expanding our barcode and RFID readers under the themes of Object Recognition and mobile. We plan to expand them globally, and at the same time, we are also working on developing businesses in other fields. What we are currently working on actively is a smart lock security solution using face recognition called “AsReader GoMA”. It can be used for recording access to rooms and can also be linked to attendance management systems. We developed it into a solution that brings together two opposing elements of security and convenience. We are offering it including a back-end system and also as a service in combination with a retrofitted smart lock device developed by a company in which we have invested.
In addition, we have also started a project on the world’s smallest-class AI camera in partnership with a company that develops innovative AI chips.
I am fortunate that the work has been incredibly enjoyable for me all this time. Going forward, I would like to take on new challenges with a sense of speed.