2023.12.20

Abandoning the assumption that “that’s why” the user is involved and creating a service that is truly close to the user – Grand Prize of the 1st TMIP Innovation Award: “matoil” by Kyocera Corporation.

In 2023, TMIP (Tokyo Marunouchi Innovation Platform), an open innovation platform that aims to support the creation of new businesses by large corporations and to create businesses through collaboration between large corporations, startups, industry, government, academia, and the city, celebrates its fifth year of operation.

In order to further encourage the creation of innovation, the TMIP Innovation Award has been newly established for large companies to recognize “outstanding examples of efforts to create new value and businesses that transcend internal and external barriers”.

The awards are given to new businesses launched over the past five years (2018-2022) from large corporations that will lead the next generation, based on a variety of perspectives, including market size, innovation, and attitude toward solving social issues.

A total of 50 entries were received for this year’s competition, from which four awards for excellence and one grand prize were selected. The award ceremony was held on November 30, 2023.

The Grand Prize went to “matoil,” a custom-made service for food allergies operated by Kyocera Corporation. In this article, we invited Ms. Minako Tani, who launched “matoil” and is still in charge of the service, to talk about how she came to create the new business, the obstacles she faced when launching it, and her vision for the future. What kind of “social inclusion (through meals)” is “matoil” aiming for? We will also share with you the comments from the judges at the award ceremony and Ms. Tani’s own words.

Focused on food allergies due to her own dietary challenges

Through the sale of meal kits for families with children with food allergies and online cooking classes for children, “matoil” is a service that aims to realize “social inclusion,” where everyone can choose what they want to eat and what they can eat.

Families with children who have food allergies are often burdened with daily cooking due to the limited ingredients available and the difficulty of using prepared foods. In addition, they have difficulty in traveling because it is difficult to know what is being used, which makes it difficult to eat out and travel. We have developed a service to solve the problems faced by people with food allergies and their families.

Ms. Tani, the planner of “matoil” and head of the “matoil” development section, graduated from Kanazawa College of Art, and joined Sanyo Electric as a designer. After that, when Kyocera took over Sanyo Electric’s cell phone and other businesses, she moved to Kyocera, where she was in charge of design work in the Telecommunications Equipment Division. Ms. Tani said behind my interest in new business was my desire to contribute more to the overall business beyond my role as a designer.

Ms. Tani: When I was working at Sanyo Denki, I was satisfied with being involved in the business as a designer, but after the M&A and other events, I realized that if the business did not turn out well, I might not be able to do the design work I loved.

Although I wanted to contribute more to the business, I began to feel that there were limits to what I could do in my role as a designer. When I thought that in order to contribute more to the business, I first needed to learn about the process from business start-up to growth, I learned that Kyocera was launching a “New Business Idea Start-up Program” within Kyocera.

I was aware that not only could I submit a business idea and, if the idea was accepted, proceed with commercialization, but I could also apply for an educational program related to business planning and promotion, which I felt would provide me with the business knowledge I was looking for.

The Kyocera New Business Idea Startup Program was launched in December 2018 with the aim of fostering a bottom-up corporate culture in which everyone can actively take on challenges. The program aims to create new businesses that are not bound by Kyocera’s existing business domains, and to solve social issues through these businesses. “matoil” was selected from among more than 800 proposals submitted in the first phase of this program.

Why did Ms. Tani focus on “food allergy”? It was based on her own experience.

Ms. Tani: “I have allergies myself. Because the type of allergy differs from person to person, I have to tell the restaurant or the person providing the meal what I cannot eat every time I eat out. In some cases, I had to refuse to participate in the meal itself, and I felt there was nothing I could do about it.

The starting point of “matoil” was that I thought that if the service aimed to solve the problems of people with food allergies, I would be able to take it as my own and promote it as a business.

Not “parties = good service providers.”

The idea that passed the screening process was an app that would match restaurants with allergens on their menus and users with their own food allergies. Although the application passed the screening process, after talking with chefs and specialists familiar with allergy sufferers, she realized that the hurdle for restaurants to introduce this app was too high, and decided to change course in June 2020, hoping to solve the issues of allergy sufferers more directly.

This decision led to the current “matoil.

From the end of July to December 2020, meal kits for those with food allergies were provided free of charge. From December of the following year, we began offering them for a fee and conducted a demonstration test as a service.

Ms. Tani: In order to deliver meals for a fee, we needed to obtain a business license. We told upper management that we wanted to set up an office to serve as our base, and they agreed, saying, ‘If you don’t do that, we won’t be able to go on to the next step. I was grateful that the company was so cooperative.

In the demonstration experiment, we verified the issues that users felt and the points that would make them happy through the provision of various products and services. In the course of repeated verification, she recalls, “As a person with allergies, I thought I understood the customers, but there were many things that I could not have realized unless I became a ‘service provider.

Ms. Tani: What we have done for the good of our customers has sometimes backfired.

For example, ‘limited time’ and ‘limited quantity’ products give a sense of scarcity value, generally make customers happy, and can be expected to generate sales in a short period of time. However, in reality, there were many kind people who would rather avoid purchasing “limited edition” products, saying, “My child has only mild symptoms, so please give it to a child who has a more difficult time.

As a person who is involved in this project, I think I know people with food allergies and share their difficulties. However, that does not directly translate into an understanding of the “required service. This is something I wouldn’t have understood until I became a service provider.”

Our goal is “a society where all people can share the same time and memories”

Based on these discoveries, Ms. Tani says that she has come to value “listening to the voice of the customer” above all else. That is why “matoil” aims to be “a place where people can feel free to ask for advice on food allergy-related issues,” and provides various opportunities for dialogue with users, both online and offline.

In conversations with users, they have heard the concerns of “I want to feed my child a glamorous restaurant-like meal, but I can’t cook it well,” and “Sometimes I want to eat food cooked by someone else,” according to one user.

To solve such problems, “matoil” offers “anniversary meal kit,” a full-course feast kit that can be custom-made to order according to food allergies and preferences.

Ms. Tani: Children with allergies have many situations where they feel different from other children in terms of snacks, school lunches, and food at events. If the meal menu is going to be different, we would rather make it special so that everyone will be envious of it.

This is why we focused on anniversaries such as birthdays. By shining a light on the happy scene of celebrating a special occasion with a delicious meal, we hope to respond as much as possible to the desire of those with allergies to eat, and to the desire of their families to feed them.

Ms.Tani adds, “I believe that the biggest problem is not that there are foods that cannot be eaten due to food allergies, but rather that these allergies limit people’s activities. What does it mean to be restricted in one’s activities?

Ms. Tani: For example, school excursions. In the past we have delivered meals to school excursion accommodations. In the past, children with severe food allergies had to bring in canned or retort-pouch foods for six meals for a three-day, two-night school trip, or freeze meals prepared in advance and have their families deliver them to their lodging.

Some people even traveled to the area near where they were staying at their own expense to cook for their children and deliver the food to them. People with allergies and their families can face such difficult situations.

Of course, the operators of hotels and other businesses want to do something about it, and by listening to the voices of not only customers but also various other businesses, we are gradually beginning to see the challenges they face. We would like to solve those issues and achieve a situation where everyone can share the same time and memories, regardless of whether they have food allergies or not.

The important thing is to get to know your customer’s “smile”

Behind matoil’s growth was also the presence of TMIP.

Kyocera Corporation is also a TMIP member, and Ms. Tani delivered online cooking classes at 3×3 Lab Future, a facility operated by Mitsubishi Estate, at a time when matoil did not have a base. She felt that Marunouchi, where companies from various countries gather and people of different nationalities come and go, was the perfect area for disseminating her services both domestically and internationally. This time, they entered the “TMIP Innovation Award” in search of further recognition and future collaboration partners.

And matoil won the Grand Prize.

At the award ceremony held on November 30, 2023, Ms. Ayumi Fujimoto, Director and CMO of Plug and Play Japan K.K., who served as a judge, commented positively, “This is a wonderful initiative, and with a high repeat rate, I think more growth is expected. In expanding our business, we feel that it is difficult to maintain our customized response to each individual customer with food allergies. What kind of development are you considering?

Ms. Tani said, “In consulting with customers with food allergies and their families, we have come up with a menu that can accommodate a variety of allergies in a comprehensive manner. Of course, we will have to continue to personalize the menu to a certain degree, but we would like to develop a more versatile menu and deliver it to more people in the future.

To achieve the goal of delivering services to more people, Ms. Tani says that the key is not to develop a generic menu, but to expand the delivery system. To this end, she says, she believes that collaboration across organizational boundaries is necessary.

Ms. Tani: There are many lodging facilities and eating places that do not accept meal kits for various reasons. In addition, the number of inbound travelers has been increasing recently, and if they are using private accommodations, they may refuse to accept our home delivery service.

In such cases, we have no choice but to hand them over in person, which is quite impossible considering the expansion of our services. We are considering various means, such as using motorcycle delivery services or renting lockers, but we have yet to find a solution. If there is a company that can solve our shipping issues, we would love to work with them.

In closing, Ms. Tani mentioned the key to launching a new business in a large company and the culture that fosters new businesses.

Ms. Tani: When launching a new business in a large company, ”numbers” such as sales are of course important. However, there are some things that cannot be understood if you only look at the numbers. That is why, when I report on the progress of our services within the company, I try to show not only numbers, but also customer feedback and pictures of people eating “matoil” food with smiles on their faces. This is because I want those who make managerial decisions to feel the significance of our business by sharing the difficulties and challenges faced by people with allergies and the joy that “matoil” can provide.

Even so, I believe that there are times when people become anxious if the numbers do not increase. In fact, one time I felt uneasy and honestly asked the president, “I have not studied business in the past, so will it be all right if I continue with the business as is? At that time, the president said to me, ‘Even if you try to make money, it will not work. First of all, you have to make your customers happy. I believe that a business can only exist when there are customers who need it, so I want you to keep working hard at it.

I think it is because the top management looks at us in this way that we are able to continue in this business, and I think that in order to nurture new businesses, it is important not to focus too much on revenue alone, but to communicate clearly what problems our services solve and what kind of smiles they bring to the faces of those who use them.