KOSHIBA MITSUNOBU

Director, JSR Corporation

To make JKiC a place of genuine open innovation

JSR Corporation has positioned life science related business as its thirdpillar. We, as a company will expand our superior material and qualitytechnologies as well as our organizational ability in order to globally developbusiness in the life science field. To achieve this, we have gone beyond thematerials business, which has been centered around our established uniquematerials, by strategically investing in KBI Biopharma (North Carolina State andColorado State, U.S.) and Selexis (Geneva, Switzerland). Both companies possessmanufacturing technologies and analysis technologies that are indispensable formanufacture biomedicines. We have also made a strategic investment in welcomingMedical & Biological Laboratories Co. (MBL) (Nagoya and Ina) to our groupenterprise. MBL has both a wide range of diagnostic agent technologies andsuperior antibody manufacturing technologies. These investments have beenpositioned to contribute to the globalization of our life science business.

We hope that JKiC will grow to be a research institute that serves as a pipeline(loading new technologies) for JSR Corporation’s life science related business.Every enterprise must carry out exploratory and basic research to support itsbusiness. Needless to say, if you were to neglect such day-to-day efforts, yourtechnologies will dry up and ultimately, you will lose your ability to competein the market. The life science field is advancing, being driven by constant newdiscoveries. Keio University School of Medicine and Keio University Hospital areconducting cutting-edge research and achieve results at an international level.Transforming this storeroom of technologies, which can be called Japan’streasure house, into value, or in other words, innovation, through JKiC is therole of JSR, and is also what Keio University expects from us.

Open innovation is a widely discussed topic, but few places actually manage topractice it. We are counting on JKiC to embody genuine open innovation. JKiC isnot intended to become a closed research institute operated only for JSR and theKeio University School of Medicine and Hospital. In order to transform KeioUniversity’s splendid technologies into innovations, it will most likely benecessary to have third parties intervene. These third parties could, accordingto circumstances, include our competitors. However, in order to achieve evengreater success, we will actively work in collaboration with said parties.

JKiC is a three-story building with one basement, and the first floor will bewide open to students and other cooperating companies. We will invite globalexperts on the themes dealt with at JKiC to form an advisory body, which willmanage progress and provide appropriate advice on JKiC’s activities.

In an age when Japan as well as other industrialized nations are being talkedabout as aged societies, the term “Quality of Life (QOL)” is being used often.JSR is determined to do all in its power to support the management of JKiC toenable it to maintain and improve QOL with its technologies and innovation,practice open innovation, and to become a research institute that attracts theworld’s attention and respect.