I am humbled by my appointment as chairman of the Robot Revolution and Industrial IoT Initiative (RRI). I would like to do my earnest best to continue to make strong progress parlaying on the efforts we have accomplished so far.

 

RRI, which was founded in May 2015 based on the “New Industrial Revolution by Robots” action plan for the “New Robot Strategy” which the government set as part of its growth strategy, is now in its eighth year since establishment. It has grown steadily over the past seven years, and the number of members has increased from 226 at the time of its launch to 427 as of June 2022. As an initiative in the field of industrial IoT, we aspire to build cooperative relationships with related organizations such as the German Industrie 4.0 promotion body and various domestic industrial associations, and further discuss solutions to counter global issues such as industrial security measures, business model construction, and human resource development. We also serve as the domestic secretariat of the Smart Manufacturing Systems Committee of the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and are actively engaged in international standardization activities.

Society 5.0, which was proposed by the government for the first time as a future goal that Japan should aim for, is a human-centered society that achieves both economic development and the resolution of social issues through a system that highly integrates cyber and physical space.

 

To realize the social implementation of Society 5.0, it is necessary to conceive a vision of society in 2030 and “back cast” from there to appropriately consider the issues and measures in the process until realization. In this process, RRI will continue to work closely with its founding body, the Japan Machinery Federation, to pursue manufacturing that responds to the digital network age using IoT and robots. We feel that we have a major mission to further promote digitization, competitiveness, and productivity reform.

 

On the other hand, with the recent development of technologies such as the metaverse and web3, in the future society where cyber and physical spaces are linked, real-time data exchange and robots that perform operations will become indispensable. We also need to consider about the challenges associated with the same. Furthermore, to realize Society 5.0 in Japan, how to construct a data infrastructure is essential, as well as how to maintain and utilize data and how to bring about innovation, including venture companies.

 

Since RRI is a collection of a wide variety of companies, there are areas entailing competition, but in the future, we will strive to work together while considering cooperative areas and hence concentrate precious resources on enhancing new value to increase global competitiveness, with pressing urgency. I will do my utmost to develop RRI for the future while utilizing the foundation that former Chairman Omiya has built, and I respectfully would like to ask for your continued support on this regard. 


Higashihara Chairperson