Print | i-grafix.com | Print News | Packaging News | Wide Format news | Australia, New Zealand and Asia Print and Packaging news from Australia, New Zealand and Asia
Konica Minolta has opened its new Asia Pacific Business Innovation Centre in Singapore.
The centre in Singapore, one of the five business innovation centres the company plans to establish around the world, will help facilitate and accelerate the growth of its information and communications technology services business.
Yuji Ichimura, general manager of ICT service business operations at Konica Minolta, says, “The decision to locate the Asia Pacific BIC in Singapore underscores Konica Minolta’s confidence in Singapore as an attractive hub for Asia Pacific regional innovation activities. Singapore’s central location in one of the world’s most dynamic, high-growth regions, combined with its vibrant innovation community, strong infrastructure and support network, make it an ideal choice to locate our Asia Pacific innovation centre.”
The centres function, to initiate, support and manage new business and technology development, will also see it incubate new ICT service businesses for Konica Minolta. It will manage the entire lifecycle of service development and incubation activities, from ideation, proof-of-concepts and pilot programmes to business development and actual business deployment activities.
Rachel Goh, director of Business Innovation Centre, Asia Pacific, Konica Minolta, says, “In the initial phase, the Asia Pacific BIC will be focusing on development of cloud-based service offerings such as software-as-a-service and business process-as-a-service to add to Konica Minolta’s intelligent office service offering. The centre will also be working closely with customers to develop industry-specific cloud-based solutions. By providing the services through the Konica Minolta cloud infrastructure, Konica Minolta will deliver the economies of scale, savings and agility to the customers.”
Using the open service innovation concept, the centre in Singapore will work with customers and collaboration partners ranging from solution providers, start-ups, research institutions, as well as crowdsourcing channels to develop and incubate new services for the Asia Pacific region. The centre is currently in close discussions with Singapore’s Institute for Infocomm Research on collaboration opportunities.
Terence Gan, director of Electronics at the Singapore Economic Development Board, says, “We are glad that Konica Minolta has chosen Singapore to locate its Asia Pacific BIC, the company’s first in the world. This is a good example of how global companies like Konica Minolta find value in our ICT capabilities to co-innovate and develop cloud-based solutions that can be scaled and exported globally. Through collaborations with our local research institutions and solution providers, we are confident that Konica Minolta will benefit from the multi-disciplinary R&D capabilities Singapore has to offer.”
Konica Minolta expects the centre to complement its research and development in the creation of new service businesses. The company currently has research and development centres in Japan and USA, focusing on fields of imaging, optics, materials and nano-fabrication.
Pictured above, from left: Ryo Maruhashi, managing director of Konica Minolta Business Solutions Asia; Rachel Goh, director of the company’s Asia-Pacific Business Innovation Centre; Yuji Ichimura, general manager of ICT service business operations; Masatoshi Matsuzaki, president and CEO; Lee Shiang Long, executive director of the Institute for Infocomm Research; and Terence Gan, from Singapore EDB
GO TO MORE ASIA NEWS
