Feature
SECOM ANSHIN Innovation
Challenge Contributing
to ANSHIN globally through
collaboration with start-up companies
In 2021 the SECOM ANSHIN Innovation Challenge was held for the first time. Innovative business plans from start-ups, which could contribute to ANSHIN, were gathered globally with a collaboration with SECOM at stake for the selected companies. In this column, we will introduce this program and hear some thoughts from the team members who managed it.
The SECOM ANSHIN Innovation Challenge is a partner competition of the start-up event SLINGSHOT 2021, organized by Enterprise Singapore in cooperation with Agorize, a company which helps enterprises to innovate and identify the best talents by connecting them with a global community of 5 million innovators. Organizers of SLINGSHOT 2021 partner competitions could set up their own independent program with a unique theme and source innovative ideas from start-ups globally. Applications of candidate companies were submitted from July to September of 2021. The first round of selections was held in mid-September, the second round was held in mid-October after a mentorship program, and the final selection was held on October 28, with the winning team participating in the SLINGSHOT 2021 Grand Finals from November 8 to 10, 2021.
The theme of the Partner Competition was set as "Ultimate ANSHIN (Peace of Mind) Beyond Boundaries." This is derived from SECOM's vision of making the Japanese word “ANSHIN,” which means providing uninterrupted peace of mind to everyone anytime and anywhere, prevail throughout the world. Our goal is to deliver ANSHIN to the world by developing services that meet local needs, leveraging the expertise we have in Japan. We are already facing challenging societal issues in Japan, such as a hyper aging population, and as the rest of the world starts facing similar issues, we want our solutions and services to be of service. As a first step towards this, we decided to organize the ANSHIN Innovation Challenge. One of the goals of the program is to increase SECOM’s presence in the ASEAN region by leveraging the channels of Government of Singapore and Agorize's network of start-up companies around the world. We also kept an eye on the access to local human resources, which is essential for developing services that capture local needs. It is also true that in some areas of the world the security service has not yet been established. In our opinion, by receiving proposals for new solutions and services from start-up companies, we could gain insight into the hidden needs of those regions.
SECOM CO., LTD
Agorize
Sarah
We were confident that, through this program, SECOM would be able to take full advantage of Agorize's worldwide network of start-ups and expertise in the execution of open innovation programs.
Singapore is now a global hub for open innovation, notably in fields such as fintech, healthcare, digital technology, and many others. The power of open innovation lies in having companies with different characteristics collaborate with one another to create better products, services, and ways of working together, realizing synergies. For example, the speed at which technology is developed and commercialized in Japan is completely different from that of other Asian regions, Europe, and the United States.
However, while the development speed is slow, the quality and safety of new-to-market products in Japan is very high.. By collaborating with innovative global companies, we thought it would be possible to develop safe products and services swiftly by combining the world’s high speed of development and commercialization with Japan’s high level of safety.
Yanling
After a discussion among the team members, we decided not to translate ANSHIN into English, keeping the Japanese spelling. Through this program, we hoped to speak both for the world’s general understanding of the expression “peace of mind” and SECOM’s unique interpretation of it. The program was an opportunity for various companies and SECOM to cooperate with each other and provide peace of mind around the world.
The main theme was set as "Ultimate ANSHIN (Peace of Mind) Beyond Boundaries," which was followed by four subthemes: Physical and Cyber Security, Healthcare, With & After COVID-19, and Wild Card. The team members had brainstormed to establish more than 10 sub-themes, from which the ones that did not deviate from the main theme of SLINGSHOT itself and that SECOM would also like to focus on were selected. First of all, security is a topic that SECOM cannot ignore, and healthcare is also a field that SECOM is focusing on, as well as one that many start-up companies have been working on in recent years. We decided on these four subthemes after discussions to include the current trend of COVID-19.
Sarah
The team in charge of this event was unique, as they were composed of multinational and diverse project members. We truly had a lively discussion, incorporating many diverse viewpoints.
Yanling
A total of 250 start-ups applied and the top five companies were selected: 20 in the first round, 10 in the second round, and 5 with one grand winner in the final round. The first round involved a document review, the second round involved mentoring* and an online presentation, and the final round involved a presentation at a virtual venue. Different evaluation criteria were established for the three selection rounds.
*The process of brushing up business plans and making ideas clearer through communication
Kasama
In the first round of selection, the project itself was evaluated based on four criteria: sustainability, scalability, customization, and affordability. In the subsequent mentoring and the second round of selection, professionals of the healthcare and cyber security fields also joined to focus on a more in-depth evaluation of technology, growth potential, and business feasibility. The final selection was joined by the executive officers who served as judges and rigorously reviewed the projects from the perspective of whether they could truly contribute to peace of mind in society.
Sarah
Agorize’s online platform was provided for the selection process. We provided Agorize's evaluation tools and proposed evaluation axes based on all our past experience to help maximize the quality of the screening process even in a short timeframe. We also provided a platform for the candidate companies to learn something through communication with SECOM, even for those who did not win the contest. We tried to make the program meaningful for all the participating companies.
Himoto
In the second round, 20 companies were mentored online. All the candidate teams were very interested in the word ANSHIN and responded by saying, "It was a very nice word," and "It had a lot in common with our philosophy." It meant a lot to us to be able to expand the concept of "peace of mind", and we felt very happy to have hosted this program.
Yanling
The second selection round was very impressive for us. Although the event was held online, I was able to feel through the screen that the participants had the enthusiasm to make society a better place through their new business.
Himoto
I have been involved in the field of robotics since my university days, so I was personally very impressed with one of the team's proposals about drones. SECOM had the experience of developing drones, therefore we knew that the legal restrictions were strict. However, even with the strict regulations, they were persistent in their ambition of developing their drone services with the assistance from legal experts. I was impressed by their willingness to take on the challenge. Unfortunately, they were not selected, however we might explore collaboration opportunities in the future.
Kasama
We are currently exploring the possibility of collaborating with the finalists, two physical security companies and one healthcare company. The healthcare company’s services were evaluated as something feasible by doctors in SECOM’s Sakra World Hospital in India. Through the discussion about POC*, we realized it was not so easy to create a new valuable service. However, we will keep exploring what we could do together with the start-ups.
*Proof of Concept: The testing of a new concept, theory, or idea.
Himoto
We felt that innovation is indispensable to make ANSHIN a common word throughout the world. Collaboration with start-up companies is one of these efforts. I would like to contribute to peace of mind in society at large by integrating SECOM's culture with innovative ideas brought in from the outside. And, in order to achieve a broad expansion outside of Japan, we believe that localization should be essential to meet the needs of each country and region. As the market grows and matures, various local needs will emerge, and we, as a service provider, are required to be able to respond to individual needs. In doing so, it is essential to build local human resources who are familiar with the culture of each country and region, as well as who also understand SECOM's technology.
If you are interested in working with us to build the ANSHIN platform, we would love to hear from you!
