Activity Report
Seminar on the Listings of Societal Issues (January 26th and February 9th)
ICF has been holding Seminars on the Listings of Societal Issues for each of the six focus areas of Resolving Societal Issues Through Innovation—Listings of Societal Issues 2023, published in October. The fourth session on January 26th and the fifth session on February 9th were held to cover the Energy & Environment area and the Mobility area, respectively.
The fourth session began with the explanation of societal issues in the Energy & Environment area and then featured Sayoko Iwasaki of Sustineri Inc. , who won the Grand Prize (ICF Award) at BAP 2023. As an example of an initiative to easily promote carbon neutrality, she spoke about an API that enables automatic calculation of CO2 emissions and carbon offsets to contribute to carbon neutrality.
At the fifth session, after the explanation of the Mobility area, Masashi Suehiro of SWAT Mobility Japan, who won the Audience Award at BAP 2023, presented examples of their solutions to the societal issues of expansion of areas where transportation is inconvenient and shortage of logistics capacity with an increase in demand. Following this, Yohei Ikeda of MRI Research Associates, Inc. explored ways to popularize EVs based on insights from MRI’s Market Intelligence & Forecast (mif) system, one of Japan’s largest questionnaire panels with 2,000 questions for 30,000 people living in Japan.
Videos of all previous sessions are now available exclusively for ICF members.
(Some content is private and not included.)
Please feel free to watch them at your convenience.
Videos: https://icf.mri.co.jp/note/lsi2023_seminar/
(in Japanese only)
New Entrepreneurial Stories of Impactful ICF Members (#40 and #41)
In order to tackle societal issues through business, entrepreneurs must have excellent interpersonal skills and strong organizational capabilities. What do they think and how are they trying to create the world they envision? The ICF has published a series of articles that sheds light on the personalities of entrepreneurs who are striving to resolve societal issues. The goal of these articles is to share with readers the philosophies of and the issues being tackled by these entrepreneurs, which in turn should accelerate future breakthroughs that contribute to society as a whole.
The new articles cover Biome Inc., which collects data on the distribution of organisms around the world using their proprietary smartphone app, and IbashoChat.org, which stays close 24/7 to those who suffer from unwanted loneliness.
The list of Japanese articles is here.
The list of English articles is here.
Upcoming Activities (February – April)
MRI DEMO DAY 2024 (March 7th)
The date of MRI DEMO DAY 2024 is approaching soon!
The event is scheduled for March 7th (Thursday) from 14:00 to 17:30 (JST) and will be held in a hybrid format.
This marks the second edition following last year’s successful event. As a think tank advancing resolutions to societal issues, MRI aims to build concrete relationships with start-up companies. Similar to last time, the purpose of this year’s DEMO DAY event is to inquire into the relationship between start-up companies by presenting specific examples of our efforts so far.
The event will include co-creation activities with the finalists of BAP 2023 and showcase co-creation efforts among ICF members (including major corporations and start-ups) stemming from the ICF network platform.
This year’s keynote speech will feature Mr. Kazunari Taguchi, the CEO of Borderless Japan Corporation, who has been a driving force in Japan’s social business development. Mr. Taguchi will share insights into the importance and challenges of co-creation efforts with start-up companies for resolving societal issues.
With so much to offer, we invite those with available time to join us at the venue
https://eiicon.net/about/mri_demoday2024/ .
Seminar on the Listings of Societal Issues (February 28th)
ICF has been holding Seminars on the Listings of Societal Issues for each of the six focus areas of Resolving Societal Issues Through Innovation—Listings of Societal Issues 2023, published in October.
The sixth and final session on February 28 will cover the Disaster Prevention and Infrastructure area.
■Time and date: 1pm – 3pm on Wednesday, February 28, 2024 JST
■Venue: Online (Zoom)
■Registration deadline: 5pm on Tuesday, February 27 JST
■Registration: https://mri.smartseminar.jp/public/seminar/view/6383
ICF General Assembly 2024 (April 22nd)
The ICF General Assembly 2024 will be held at the start of the new fiscal year in April. The agenda includes a review of ICF activities in FY 2023, explanation of the activity policy and plans for the new fiscal year, and introduction of new members.
More details will be provided later, so please mark the date on your calendar.
■Time and date: 3:30pm – 5pm on April 22, 2024 JST
■Venue: Online and the fourth floor of the headquarters of Mitsubishi Research Institute
Note: A networking event will be held at the venue after the assembly.