[Nagoya x Business] ASNOVA and Tryetting's passion for aiming for the world from Nagoya

Nagae: TRYETING Inc. is an AI venture company spun out of Nagoya University that automates "intelligent tasks" such as recognition, future prediction, and optimization. We specialize in optimizing people and things related to the supply chain, focusing on inventory management and work shift management, and are working on "intelligent task automation" in a wide range of fields, including manufacturers, retailers, logistics, and trading companies.

 

We have developed the "UMWELT" system, which solves the issues of "introduction costs and long development times" that are the main challenges in introducing AI technology, and provide automation solutions for forecasting operations to corporate core systems. We also developed and sell "HRBEST," which uses AI to create complex shifts with one click.

Nagae: The company name Tryetting comes from the phrase "Keep TRYING to make something new which doesn't exist YET!" Tryetting was born from these words "TRYING" and "YET". A more compact version of this phrase, and one that succinctly expresses our stance on manufacturing, is "Creating The Future of Tomorrow, Today!" It expresses our desire to "create today the ideas for manufacturing that do not exist in today's society, but will be so commonplace in tomorrow's society that we cannot imagine a world without them."

For example, our mission is to "create tomorrow's future today" with the desire to "create today" products that no one in the world has ever seen before, such as transistors, which are essential to our business activities and have an irreversible impact that will "create tomorrow's future."

Nagae: Our company is a venture company that originated from Nagoya University. I was affiliated with Nagoya University during my university days, and I co-founded the company with CTO Takeshima and COO Suganuma. That's why Nagoya was my base of operations.

 

After founding the company, we thought it would be better to have local knowledge in order to do business, so we set up our base in Nagoya because it was an easy place to do business. In addition, there are now benefits to working in Nagoya compared to Tokyo in terms of prices and rent. From an employment perspective, we need to support the lives of our employees, so in that sense, we think it was a good decision to set up our base in an area where our employees can easily live.

Ueda: I came to Nagoya when I started my business 10 years ago.

Scaffolding Rental Business started about 15 years ago in Tsuruga City, Fukui Prefecture. However, since we have been in the rental business mainly in Kansai, Nagoya, and Kanto, we spent our days traveling from Fukui Prefecture by Shinkansen every day. Gradually, fatigue accumulated, and when I took the plunge and started a business, I decided to work in Nagoya as my home base because of a connection with people.

 

Nagae: You completely changed the business scope, and as a fellow manager, I was very impressed that you were able to make the decision, knowing how scary it would be. There was no precedent, and in golf terms, there was no line to follow, so I wonder how scary it must have been for you to be the first to do it.

Ueda: My first thought was that it would be so easy to do business in Nagoya. I don't want you to misunderstand when I say "easy," but Tsuruga City in Fukui Prefecture, where I started my business, has a small population of about 60,000. Nagoya City has a population of about 2.29 million, so in Tsuruga City, I would be competing with a population of about 60,000. The larger the population, the greater the demand for rental properties, so I felt it would be "easy."

 

Nagae: There are about 500 AI-related companies nationwide. Most of them are based in Tokyo. It was difficult to start in Nagoya in this environment, but I am very happy that our customers choose us because we are a "Nagoya company."

Ueda: It's "thank you" after all. It's the best thing to hear it from a customer. Maybe it's because of those words that I've been able to continue this far. I still have a customer who's been with me since the company was first established, and now, even as a manager, he's been very helpful to me. It really makes me realize how important human connections are.

 

Nagae: Of course, there are senior managers who I can never look up to. But when they say "thank you," it makes me happy, even though it's a simple phrase.

Nagae: Nagoya is often associated with automobiles, but it is actually a city of textiles.

Due to the nature of the area, our founding began with forecasting the demand for apparel. We forecast how many clothes of many colors and sizes need to be shipped and where. Delivering what is needed, when it is needed, and in the quantities needed, to the customers who need it on demand is impossible without forecasting, and that is the very reason why we operate locally. In fact, many of our customers are in Nagoya, so we are working hard there and will continue to work to contribute to Nagoya.

Ueda: I was fortunate enough to have a relationship with Trieting, so I'm thinking about whether I can do something that makes good use of ChatGPT, which has become popular recently. scaffolding is a linear business, bought and discarded, especially in Asia. The materials are ruined in about five years, so there is no sense of renting at all. I would like to make good use of this opportunity and challenge the world from Nagoya.

 

Nagae: It's about changing your behavior. You have to change your way of thinking.

 

Ueda: When it comes to what to do if you want to procure scaffolding, I think it would be possible to do it well with ChatGPT in Vietnam, saying, "You can borrow scaffolding with ASNOVA."

Nagae: We sometimes go to Hanoi, Vietnam, and it's a construction rush. I heard that your company is now focusing on educating you on how easy it is to assemble wedge binding type scaffold, and I feel that it is very essential. I feel that I can see a future in which your company is contributing to the rise in the building level of a country that is developing more and more in the future.

 

There are not many examples in the world of using data to create products, especially in predictive work, in the field of manufacturing. The psychological hurdle is high, and many people do not have the courage to rely on the results of predictions to create products. I feel that we have been able to encourage this behavioral change in many customers over the past two to three years through us. Japan's construction and manufacturing processes are uniquely complex, so know-how that is applicable in Japan is always applicable overseas. Therefore, I think that the way I would like to develop in the future is to become a "behind the scenes" for companies that are active globally. I would like to help your company grow. I would like to work with you in both marketing and business.

This interview is a collaborative project with Tryetting Co., Ltd.

On the website of Trietting Co., Ltd., there is a dialogue article in which President Nagae and Ueda talk about the theme of "scaffolding ×DX".

Please check out this article as well!