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SOLVING SOCIAL PROBLEMS THROUGH OUR BUSINESS
The INTAGE Group uses data to support customers' businesses, solve social problems, and contribute to the creation of a better society and the healthy lives of consumers.
Sustainability priorities (important issues) helps us strengthen trusting relationships with stakeholders and meet the demands and expectations of society. We strive to grow a sustainable business and contribute to social development by enhancing our corporate value as well as social value.
SUSTAINABILITY PRIORITIES
We contribute to the enhancement of the business value of our customers by utilizing data from the perspective of consumers
We ensure proper handling of personal information and information security
We encourage cooperation with industry, government, and academia, and create innovation
We foster and produce human resources that will lead the future
A Cross-Group Technology Competition Expanding the Circle of Technology
We foster and produce human resources that will lead the future
The companies of the INTAGE Group operate businesses with research and data at their core, and we believe that continuously improving data handling skills is an important challenge. The cross-Group technology competition that has been run since FY2021 is designed to form a culture of indepth technological inquiry, foster the development of human resources with data analysis skills, and promote technological improvement and exchange across organizational boundaries. The endeavor aims to achieve Groupwide growth by having employees put their data analysis and programming skills to the test against one another.
In the second year of the competition in FY2022, the theme of "Automated Playing of Dobutsu Shogi ("animal chess") * " was adopted, and a total of 12 contestants from various Group companies used programming languages such as Python to develop programs based on their own approaches and have the programs play games of Dobutsu Shogi. In the future, we will scale up the competition as an opportunity
Metaversefor the development of human resources and technological exchange, and expect this to spread the culture of in-depth technological inquiry across the Group.
* A simplified version of Shogi (Japanese chess) rules that uses five types of pieces with animal designs and a 3x4 playing board. The game was invented to professional Shogi player Madoka Kitao.
An automated match of Shogi underway
Roundtable Discussion Among Cancer Patients Who Can Speak More Comfortably in the Metaverse
We contribute to the enhancement of the business value of our customers by utilizing data from the perspective of consumers
INTAGE Healthcare Inc., which conducts pharmaceutical marketing research and other activities exclusively in the healthcare field, conducts research into patients suffering from a range of conditions. With online interviews on the rise in addition to in-person interviews, the latest development is roundtable discussions for cancer patients being held in the metaverse. We were able to verify the effectiveness of metaverse-based roundtable discussions as a new interviewing method for when participants have concerns, such as not wanting to reveal themselves to others, or having difficulty discussing private matters.
As participants are able to share their opinions and express their intentions through an avatar without showing their own face, the form has earned high satisfaction ratings from participants, eliciting feedback such as "an illness is a very private thing, and since I could use an avatar to speak, I was able to expose my feelings with peace of mind." Metaverse-based roundtable discussions are expected to be utilized in the future as an interview method with a view to their potential to produce more in-depth analysis and discussion.
Scene from a roundtable discussion
Industry-Academia Collaboration Initiatives
We encourage cooperation with industry, government, and academia, promote interindustry collaboration and create innovation
We foster and produce human resources that will lead the future
The cultivation of data science talent who will support an advanced information society and the promotion of innovation through collaboration with educational institutions not only affect the Company but are challenges for all industries.
We promote collaboration between industry and academia in various ways utilizing our strength in handling data,
including through the initiatives described below. In addition to contributing to solving the issues described earlier, these activities help raise the profile of the INTAGE Group and expand hiring opportunities for future talent. In the fiscal year ended June 2023, Groupwide we participated in industryacademia collaboration initiatives with 26 universities*.
* The number of universities that took part in initiatives with the Company during the fiscal year ended June 2023.
Provision of Company Data
We supply various research data to universities and research laboratories as learning and research materials. By using "live" data that is actually used in business, we provide students with opportunities to experience the process of trial and error in real analysis.
Universities provided data (in Japanese alphabetical order, fiscal year ended June 2023) : Aoyama Gakuin University, Jissen Women's University, Chiba University, Chuo University, Tokyo Metropolitan University, Meiji University, Meiji Gakuin University, Yokohama National University, Waseda University, etc.
In addition, to make data widely available to individual researchers, students and others, we also provide data to the Informatics Research Data Repository (IDR) operated by the National Institute of Informatics.
Project-based Learning(PBL)
We dispatch employees for university seminars, supporting a curriculum aimed at acquiring data analysis capabilities and actual business problem-solving abilities by analyzing data provided by the Company, considering hypotheses and developing plans, using real problems such as "developing an e-commerce site and app that makes research easy to perform from the perspective of university students" as themes.
Scene from a session where students present their plans
Off-site Classes Given by Employees
As a part of collaboration with educational institutions, Company employees work as instructors for classes on marketing research, data analysis and statistics at universities across Japan.
Scene from a class being taught by an employee (Special class on "Data and Statistics Used in Business" taught at the Chukyo University School of Economics)
Support for Clinical and Drug Discovery Research
INTAGE Healthcare Inc. supports the research activities of universities in various ways, such as by assisting university research to create new compounds as candidate drugs using its Deep Quartet AI-based drug discovery platform, developing an infrastructure to facilitate the collection of biological samples from university hospitals in order to conduct clinical trials, and providing a system to collect information about adverse effects.
Universities conducting joint research through AI drug discovery (in Japanese alphabetical order, fiscal year ended June 2023) : Okayama University, Tokyo University of Science, Nagoya University, Hiroshima University
Industry-Academia Collaborative Consumer Research Projects That Connect Companies with Students
With INTAGE Inc. acting as a hub, the projects connect customers dealing with issues in understanding consumers with universities and university students with academic knowledge and viewpoints as consumers. The service helps the participants gain business insight by having them jointly tackle the issues. Two projects were run in the fiscal year ended June 2023, involving 19 corporate clients and seven universities in total.
SRI-Hitotsubashi Consumer Purchase Index
The SRI-Hitotsubashi Consumer Purchase Index jointly developed by Hitotsubashi University, the National Supermarket Association of Japan and INTAGE Inc. is an index designed to clarify the relationships between consumption behaviors and approaches such as per-package volume adjustments and special bargain sales often seen in the price setting practices of Japanese companies. The SRI+® panel research product of INTAGE Inc. can be used to help understand the purchasing behavior of consumers from new perspectives.
Learn more about the SRI-Hitotsubashi Consumer Purchase Index here(http://www.srihito.com/)