OMRON Establishes OMRON SINIC X Corporation in Quest of “Near-future Designs”

The Research Company Is A Strategic Foothold That Invests In Human Capital In The Fields Of Various Leading-Edge Technologies In Order To Solve Social Issues In Each Field With A Focus On Four Key Domains: Factory Automation (FA), Healthcare, Mobility and Energy Management

OMRON Corporation, based in Kyoto, announced the establishment of OMRON SINIC X Corporation, a research company that designs the near future, in Hongo, Tokyo, which began its full-scale operation on April 26, 2018. OMRON SINIC X will conduct research to help the OMRON Group achieve JPY1 trillion in sales, JPY100 billion in operating income, and other fiscal 2020 goals as defined under the company’s VG2.0 medium-term management plan, as well as to accelerate the creation of technologies and new business activities that spur growth after 2020.

The research company is a strategic foothold that creates what OMRON sees as “near-future designs.” It has employed prominent human capital in the fields of various leading-edge technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, Internet of things (IoT), manufacturing and finance. Each researcher will create “near-future designs” by integrating a business model, technology strategy and intellectual property strategy, and breaking it down into concrete business architecture based on technological innovation in order to solve social issues in each field with a focus on four key domains: factory automation (FA), healthcare, mobility and energy management. The company will also pursue open innovation in collaboration with universities and external research institutions to expedite the creation of “near-future designs.”

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Since its foundation, OMRON has contributed to the development of the world by anticipating social changes and introducing automation to society through technological development and business creation. In recent years, technologies represented by AI, IoT and robotics have rapidly advanced, and these technological advances have triggered changes of the social environment in a discontinued way.

Under these circumstances, in an effort to further contribute to the development of society through technological development and business creation, OMRON has, since the establishment of the chief technology officer (CTO) in 2015, focused on enhancing OMRON’s unique “management of technology” that concretely designs the near future based on technological innovation, clearly backcasts strategies necessary to realize the design, and implements them. As part of the enhancement of the “management of technology,” OMRON established the Innovation Exploring Initiative Headquarters in March 2018. The Innovation Exploring Initiative Headquarters, which is positioned as a platform to improve the corporate capability to create innovation, assumes responsibilities comprehensively from “near-future designs” to strategy development and business verification. To support these activities, the Edge-type AI Development Center (in Shinagawa, Tokyo) and the Robotics Development Center (on the west coast of the United States) were established. In collaboration with the existing organizations such as the Keihanna Technology Innovation Center as well as each business basis, OMRON will make group-wide efforts to pursue strategy development, business verification, technological development and product development on the basis of “near-future designs,” thereby further improving the capability to create innovation.

OMRON will continue to strengthen the “management of technology” to accelerate innovation, solving social issues through the group’s business activities.

To develop “near-future designs” by drawing up plans for the target future that reflect technological innovation and social changes, overlooking them from the perspectives of business, technology and intellectual property, and formulating hypotheses about innovative customer values at a socially viable level, and to create new core technologies by quickly understanding trends in technological innovation necessary to realize the near-future designs.

“SINIC” is the name of a future prediction theory that OMRON Corporation founder Kazuma Tateisi published in 1970 from the idea that in order to manage a business by anticipating social needs, it is necessary to predict a future society. The name of the new company represents a combination of “SINIC,” a symbol of the near future, and “X,” unknown technology.

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