Updated: May 27, 2024

Pursuing Research that Will Elicit "Gratitude" Instead of "Amazement"

Toward laboratories that lead the way in optimizing the benefits to society overall

Research and Development Division of NEC differs somewhat from what is typically considered a conventional research lab. Initially, the lab was established to develop cutting-edge technologies that would enhance our business operations. However, from the 1990s onward, our lab has embraced the challenge of proposing solutions to societal issues by combining multiple technologies and ideas. More recently, we have achieved notable results by designing flexible commercialization processes that are not constrained by conventional thinking. For example, in some cases the researchers themselves spin out businesses, and in other cases independent companies are launched together with customers from the initial stages of research and development. Through the proper use of flexible exit paths according to the characteristics of the developed technologies without being caught up in the stereotype of productization through internal business divisions, we have achieved the rapid commercialization of research results. These initiatives are drawing significant interest in the field of business management studies, as they represent an innovative model for corporate research and development activities.

As our commercialization flow reforms (i.e. exit reforms) are now producing certain results, we have turned our attention to launch of new research themes (i.e. entry reforms). Looking ahead, we are now focused on research and development that leads the way in "total optimization" aimed at solving social problems. For example, regarding environmental problems, the shift toward carbon neutral activities has accelerated in recent years, and various companies and nations are stepping up their efforts. However, to respond to the pressing issue of climate change, it is absolutely essential for a wide variety of business entities and nations to collaborate in a concerted effort, rather than acting individually as companies or organizations. As various institutions and task forces are vying to take the helm, NEC can also play such a leading role by contributing very smoothly to a diverse range of industries through activities centered around ICT. By engaging with a wide variety of people, companies, and countries, we can pursue ways to ensure the proper functioning overall. You can say that this is one of our great values.

If you think about it, many companies and organizations, including NEC, have conducted development that seeks to maximize the "production output to cost ratio." However, the global challenges facing the current era cannot be resolved simply by improving the products and processes that one company has in front of it. The pursuit of maximizing the "production output to cost ratio" should be eliminated and replaced by other new types of scales, such as "happiness per environmental impact" for example, and we need to think about the optimization of social systems overall. However, there will of course be winners and losers among those who pursue new initiatives. For this reason, we cannot begin solving the fundamental problems unless the overall convenience and profits can be shared.

For this reason, I think the AI technologies and platforms that we produce should be useful. They should visualize the world based on data, and present actions in a form that is comprehensible to us humans. Of course, this should be done with minimal impact on the environment. Using the power of ICT, we would like to take a broader perspective and contribute to the creation of greater security, safety, equality, and efficiency by promoting DX and total optimization of social systems and business. With such a perspective, we are pursuing activities aimed at developing laboratories that lead the way in solving social problems on a global scale.

Combining NEC’s long-cultivated technological assets with novel concepts

The concept of cyber-physical systems (CPS) serves as the framework for achieving overall optimization. By recreating the physical world as a "digital twin" within an information system and employing "human-AI collaboration" to analyze and predict its mechanisms, we can derive optimal actions. Concurrently, we provide a platform to conduct this entire process securely and in an environmentally friendly manner. The following are the three areas that form the pillars of our research and development endeavors.

For many years, NEC has continuously developed technological assets across three key domains. However, a disruptive new technology has recently emerged—foundation models that underpin the next generation of AI technologies known as generative AI. By leveraging these foundation models, we can not only dramatically enhance the development efficiency of digital twins and AI technologies that we previously designed individually, but we can also enable implementations that are more robust and user-friendly compared to those individual designs. Foundation models also allow us to strengthen a wide range of functionalities within our platform, such as operational automation.

At NEC, we are vigorously driving technological development forward by establishing foundation models and their applications as our fourth strategic pillar. Not only are we proactively using generative AI, but we are also independently building foundation models from scratch. This dual strategy allows us to construct a diverse array of societal solutions, realizing superior performance while maintaining both safety and transparency.

Real challenges are found on-site, not in research papers

I often emphasize that the real challenges our customers face are not found in research papers but in their everyday operations. No matter how diligently you study cutting-edge academic papers, you cannot fully identify issues that hold significant social value. It is only through careful observation and discussion of the actual activities of customers—both in their daily lives and business workflows—that you can truly pinpoint such important issues.

Under such circumstances, what is required of us researchers is a certain type of consulting ability. You might even call it "facilitation ability." We must dive into the customer's environment to discover what kinds of customer value can be produced by the technologies that we create. One point of difficulty is that the issues are not always apparent to the customers themselves. As such, we should be focused on achieving two-way communication that elicits potential issues and new ideas through dialogue with customers. Also, we should not depend on our internal business divisions for this, as it is extremely meaningful for the researchers themselves to engage in. In fact, there is a real sense that those research teams that have achieved great results have collaborated well with customers.

This ability is also important in the open innovation that we are actively promoting. In various situations such as setting research themes, problem solving, and technology evaluation, we are co-creating with a diverse range of partners, including universities, research institutes, and companies. The reason why we are promoting this initiative under a "collaboration first" approach is because we believe that encounters between different fields create innovation. Opportunities to meet experts in a variety of fields and talk with people that have a wide range of interests can lead to new ideas.

Our goal is social implementation. It is far more important to create value for customers and society than to publish an academic paper announcing that we have increased the performance by a certain percentage. We are pursuing research that will elicit gratitude from a wide range of stakeholders, rather than amazement.

That being said, I must also tell you that papers by NEC researchers continue to be accepted in great numbers by top international conferences. Many creative ideas and technologies originating from customer sites have been recognized worldwide.

Social issues have no national borders and neither do research activities. As a group of researchers representing the world, NEC Laboratories will continue to evolve and contribute to society going forward.

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