Promotion of Co-innovation through Collaboration with Different Business Sectors

1. Introduction

With the objective of revitalizing the information and communication technology (ICT) market through new-value creation, NTT EAST and NTT WEST have shifted their business models to a Hikari Collaboration Model, under which their business partners are allowed to re-sell NTT’s optical access services. To accelerate this switch in business model from the conventional B2C (business-to-consumer) to B2B2X (business-to-business-to-consumer, government, or company), the NTT Group is involved in ongoing co-innovation activities with partners from a variety of different business sectors.

For example, in collaboration with four major companies, NTT WEST began efforts [1] in April 2015 to further accelerate co-innovation aimed at creating new business through facilitating cooperation between large and established businesses and start-ups. In July 2016, in collaboration with McLaren Racing Limited and Honda Motor Co., Ltd., NTT Communications initiated efforts [2] to establish an optimum ICT platform to support Formula 1 racing teams.

Over the last three or four years, NTT has maintained business alliances with Dwango Co., Ltd. [3] and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. [4] and is continuing efforts aimed at creating new value by utilizing research results in the ICT field. The co-innovation effort with Dwango is targeted at upgrading video and social networking services, so we have been jointly developing interactive streaming technology for omnidirectional video, which can deliver immersive video even when bandwidth is limited. This technology was implemented as a virtual-reality live streaming service [5].

The co-innovation project with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries involves the commercialization of a high-noise-reduction head-set type intelligent microphone, which can collect sound clearly even in noisy environments (i.e., at a noise level close to 100 dB) such as factories and building sites, through our combined research and development (R&D) efforts [6].

In addition, we are involved in several other co-innovation activities. For example, in collaboration with Daiichi Kosho Co., Ltd., we are carrying out joint investigations using NTT’s speech processing technology [7]. We believe that the significant results of implementing the above-described co-innovation activities by utilizing NTT’s own technologies will help to solve problems in society and create value through new markets.

2. Solutions to social problems and creation of value in new markets

The NTT Group aims to support sustainable development in society and is therefore working on solving various social problems. However, many social problems—such as Japan’s decreasing birthrate and aging population as well as sluggish employment generation—can neither be solved single-handedly nor by ICT alone. Nevertheless, we can expect to open up completely new markets by applying ICT. Under these circumstances, we aim to solve social problems and create value in new markets by utilizing NTT technology. We describe in this section some of our ongoing efforts.

3. Future development

In this article, examples of our latest efforts concerning co-innovation activities were described. NTT Service Evolution Laboratories will continue to promote co-innovation in cutting-edge R&D under the aim of creating value in collaboration with NTT Group companies and partners in various fields.

References

Tsuguhiro Ohashi Senior Research Engineer, Co-innovation Promotion Project, NTT Service Evolution Laboratories. He received a B.E. and M.E. in materials science and engineering from Nagoya Institute of Technology, Aichi, in 1998 and 2000. He joined NTT WEST in 2000. In August the same year, he moved to NTT Cyber Solutions Laboratories, where he researched human interface technology. In 2004, he moved to NTT WEST again, where he developed network services. He is currently involved in co-innovation promotion.

Shinkuro Honda Senior Research Engineer, Supervisor, Co-innovation Promotion Project, NTT Service Evolution Laboratories. He received a B.E., M.E., and Ph.D. in engineering from Keio University, Kangawa. He joined NTT Cyber Space Laboratories in 1999, where he led a virtual reality and cyberspace R&D project and developed collaboration systems. He spent time at the NTT Group San Jose Office, USA, where he was involved in incubating a new business endeavor with venture firms. He joined NTT Service Evolution Laboratories in 2015, where he is involved in co-innovation promotion. He is a member of the Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers, the Information Processing Society of Japan, and the Virtual Reality Society of Japan.