“We have eliminated the president’s office and executive office.” IBM Japan’s President Yamaguchi’s commitment to taking on the challenge of value co-creation: Interview with a trend leader in the IT industry! (1/4 page) – ITmedia PC USER

IBM Japan has released its own generative AI “Watsonx” to the market, and in February 2024, it has also started offering the Japanese version of its large-scale language model “Granite”. . Akio Yamaguchi, president of IBM Japan, has revealed that IBM Japan’s president, Akio Yamaguchi, will move forward with the development of industry-specific, Japan-specific generative AI that is optimized for enterprises.

Meanwhile, IBM Japan will relocate its headquarters to Toranomon Hills Station Tower in Minato-ku, Tokyo on January 30, 2024. While positioning the company as a hub where customers, partners, and employees can have lively discussions, the company is also the first president in history to abolish the president’s office.

In the second part of the interview, we will talk to IBM Japan’s President Yamaguchi about his efforts in generative AI, the aim of relocating to Toranomon’s new headquarters, as well as IBM Japan’s plans for promoting DX in the value co-creation area, addressing sustainability, and human resource development. We also asked about their efforts.

Differences between Japan and the US in how to utilize IT and data

—What kind of results have you achieved in the second area of ​​value co-creation, “DX utilizing technologies such as hybrid cloud and AI”?

YamaguchiThis is wide-ranging. We support the promotion of DX for Japanese customers in various industries such as finance, medical care, retail, and manufacturing, and one unique feature is our demonstration experiment of airport security operations using AI-equipped robots at Chubu Centrair International Airport. At the Juntendo Hospital Pediatric Medical Center attached to Juntendo University School of Medicine, we have jointly developed a Metaverse visitation app that allows you to meet with inpatients on the Metaverse.Using volumetric video technology, we have created a 3D image of yourself on your business card. There are also examples of developing AR solutions that can express small alter egos.

There is often a discussion comparing mainframes and clouds, but this contrast itself is wrong. IT systems should be viewed as a combination of on-premises and cloud usage, and hardware such as mainframes and small and medium-sized machines such as servers.

Mainframes may be used on-premises or in the cloud. Additionally, servers may be used on-premises or in the cloud. If you organize it into these four quadrants and clarify what you want to do, whether to emphasize economic rationality, whether to emphasize stable operation, or whether to emphasize data security, you can decide where to proceed. You will understand what is going on. Companies that clarify what they want to achieve and understand how to put the right people in the right places to operate the system are successful in DX.

—It has been pointed out that Japan’s DX efforts are far behind those in the United States and other countries. How do you judge the current situation?

YamaguchiI don’t think Japan is necessarily behind. There are also advanced examples among Japanese companies, and the reality is that the companies that are advanced are quite advanced. Companies that approach DX with a clear attitude of wanting to create new business are producing results.

However, in the case of companies that have vague ideas about what to use IT for or what to do with DX, it is easy to think that DX is the job of the IT department, leading to a slight drop in productivity. There are notable cases where the price has ended at a level where the price has increased.

DX is not an initiative undertaken only by the IT department, but an initiative that involves management. Thinking about how to grow a company is a natural task for managers. IT just happens to be the tool responsible for management transformation, but if you misunderstand that it is something that only the IT department can do and leave it entirely to the IT department, DX will not lead to results. .

In addition, companies that use IT because they believe that it can reduce costs or increase productivity, and companies that aim to use IT and data to create businesses that increase their top line, differ in how they use IT. are completely different. I feel that many Japanese companies are of the former type, and many American companies are of the latter type.

This is the same as when the internet came out. At the time, Japanese companies were attracting attention because they could easily search the Internet, eliminating the need for dictionaries, and how Wikipedia made it easy to understand everything, but in the case of American companies, Many people wondered if they could use this amazing tool to start a new business.

To use an analogy, Japanese companies believe that when cars are introduced, they will be able to move quickly and conveniently, increase productivity, and accelerate their current business. The attitude of American companies is to create new types of vehicles such as taxis and buses, and to create new businesses such as transportation and tourism. Japanese companies are good at thinking about expanding their business as an extension of their current business, but it can be said that they have little idea of ​​creating new business that has never existed before.

The same thing is about to happen with generative AI, which has been attracting attention recently. In Japan, the focus is on topics and news such as how generative AI has increased work productivity, or how people can now write approval documents and emails for them. Although this is an important result, it is also true that there are few examples or news of it being used to create new business.

WatsonX, a generative AI developed by IBM, was developed with the premise of being used by companies, but it is not provided solely for the purpose of increasing productivity or convenience, but rather that it is a platform. But as you can see, the aim is to use this to support the creation of new business. Japanese companies are characterized by having a large amount of data and the quality of that data is high. It can be said that Japan is the country with the best environment for creating new business using generative AI.