An expert who has created new businesses through data utilization talks about the current state of mobility data utilization and the future possibilities that can be expanded by "connecting"

SmartDrive Co., Ltd. (Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo) utilizes mobility data such as vehicle location information and driving history to provide vehicle management services for corporations and safe driving monitoring services for individuals. Hirotake Motogakiuchi, the company's director, is a data analysis expert who has been involved in many technological and business developments. We spoke with him about the characteristics of "mobility data," how it is used, and what value can be extracted by connecting it with various other data.
*Job titles, affiliations, and services provided are current as of the time of the interview.

Mobility data holds great potential, but full-scale utilization has only just begun

Your company was founded in October 2013. Why did you start your business by focusing on "mobility" in the first place?

"Mobility" has been a major theme closely related to human life since ancient times. In recent years, the automotive and logistics industries have undergone a once-in-a-century period of great change, with technological innovations such as autonomous driving and electrification, and the development of new services such as e-commerce and car sharing, and interest in "mobility" is growing worldwide.

It was against this backdrop that our CEO, Retsu Kitagawa, founded the company while he was a graduate student researching mobile data analysis, and began the business by almost single-handedly creating the basic mechanisms for collecting and analyzing mobility data. I majored in statistical analysis at undergraduate and graduate school, and had been working on data utilization at a web company. I joined the company as the second employee in January 2015, about a year after the company was founded, and have since been in charge of technological and business development for utilizing mobility data.

What specific services do you provide and to whom?

Broadly speaking, there are two types of services: services that we provide ourselves, with the SmartDrive name at the forefront, and services that utilize the technology and know-how we have cultivated to support our customers' businesses and initiatives from behind the scenes.

First, in the former category, we offer services such as "SmartDrive Fleet," a corporate service that improves the efficiency of vehicle management and promotes safe driving by drivers, and "SmartDrive Families," a personal service that allows families to monitor the driving habits of elderly people and other individuals based on their driving information.

Meanwhile, the latter involves car manufacturers and other companies utilizing our systems and know-how when they roll out services that improve operations using vehicle location information, such as Honda's "Honda FLEET MANAGEMENT." Naturally, each company's initiatives are diverse, and so are the roles expected of us within them. We support each company's service creation at three major levels: from the level of collecting mobility data using equipment we have developed or commonly available devices such as dashcams, to the level of analyzing the collected mobility data using our systems, and finally the level of incorporating that data into applications and services.

First of all, what exactly is "mobility data"?

The basic information is location information obtained by GPS, but mobility data also includes information obtained in conjunction with that, such as speed and acceleration in the case of a car, steering and braking operation history, vibrations caused by uneven road surfaces, and video and still images taken by dashcams.In a broader sense, information such as the temperature changes in refrigerators during the ultra-low temperature transport of the COVID-19 vaccine, which has become a hot topic, can also be considered a type of mobility data, as it is obtained in conjunction with movement.

Generally, some people have concerns about using mobility data, such as their location being identified and their privacy being violated, or their personal information being used without their consent. However, as I mentioned earlier, there are many different types of mobility data, and many things can be achieved using data other than location information. Even when using mobility data, location information is not necessarily required.

So how is mobility data actually used in general?

The most widespread type of GPS is, of course, navigation systems such as car navigation systems. Tracking your location in real time and using it to guide you to your destination has become commonplace over the past few decades. With the spread of smartphones, services that utilize GPS data have also become widespread.

However, the reality is that it is still relatively unfamiliar for people to measure and collect mobility data themselves and use it in a data-driven way in their daily lives and corporate activities. For example, the automotive industry has a very long history and advanced technology that has made it possible to put self-driving cars into practical use, and the use of data necessary to improve the sophistication of automobiles themselves has made great strides. However, at the same time, the "democratization" of mobility data use has not progressed to the point where many companies that use automobiles collect and utilize data from their own vehicles as a matter of course, and there is still plenty of room for future growth. This situation contrasts with the Internet industry, where data use is rapidly progressing, such as visualizing and analyzing various business data to improve operational efficiency and predict the future.

The utilization of mobility data still has a long way to go.

That's right. However, for that very reason, it is meaningful to simply visualize and understand various mobility data, and even such a simple step has ample room for new value to be created. Simply by visualizing the operational status of business vehicles, it is possible to automate the creation of daily driving reports based on that information and improve driver satisfaction. In that sense, I think this is a very interesting field with great potential.

Through our efforts to date, we have learned that even simple information that is now easily obtainable, such as location information, can be used to gain various insights and achieve a lot if it is handled well. For this reason, rather than blindly collecting and connecting various types of data from the start, we value an approach that starts from the idea of how we can make better use of basic data, such as location information, to provide value in a simple way.

Of course, there are many things that can only be discovered by combining various types of data, and there is also a lot of value that can be created from that. Therefore, it is extremely important to be able to connect data without much effort and quickly focus on activities that will create essential value.

New value can be created by "connecting" existing data

Indeed, your website contains many examples of successful outcomes achieved through unexpected uses and combinations of mobility data. Please introduce examples of how combining mobility data with data from other fields, or linking mobility data together in unprecedented combinations, has contributed to business and social transformation and the creation of new value.

For example, in a collaboration between Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd. and Nightley Inc., which provides regional revitalization support solutions using location information big data and analysis technology, a demonstration experiment was conducted to combine mobility data and social media data with the aim of maximizing regional tourism resources. By combining vehicle location data and social media data posted by tourists, tourist movements, interests, and tourist spots that are often passed by can be "visualized," and this is being used for measures to smooth tourist movement and to guide tourists to less well-known hidden spots and tourist attractions.

So you have truly created new value. Can you tell us any other examples?

Another example of cross-domain data collaboration is the development of insurance tailored to each customer's risk by combining mobility data with accident and trouble data integration accumulated by Sumitomo Mitsui Auto Service Co., Ltd. and its affiliates. Combining accident and trouble data with driving data reveals what driving habits are less likely to cause accidents. In that case, it would be fair to offer lower insurance premiums to those who drive safely, and as a result, we can expect a positive impact on society by promoting safe driving. There are many cases like this where value that could never be created by mobility data alone has been created by linking it with data from other domains.

What does your company pay attention to when using data to contribute to business and society?

We believe it is extremely important to lower the hurdles as much as possible when taking the first step towards utilization, and to make it easy to continue, and we make such proposals to our clients. Of course, it would be ideal if all the data you want was available from the start, and the infrastructure for accurately analyzing it was in place. However, if you try to do that from the beginning, you will inevitably need expensive equipment and specialized personnel, so in the end, you will likely only make the first move, or give up on the initiative altogether. That would be pointless, wouldn't it?

For example, by using basic data such as location information and supplementing the rest with rough guesses, you can often achieve 70 to 80 percent of the worldview you're aiming for in a new initiative by skillfully assembling the value you can provide, without having to purchase expensive equipment or spend too much time pursuing perfect accuracy from the start. Therefore, you should compare the objectives of data utilization with the current situation and design the most cost-effective project. Once you've cleared the initial hurdle and realized the value, you can invest in equipment as a next step and aim even higher. I believe the key to data utilization is to proceed step by step, starting with what you can comfortably do, rather than trying to do everything at once.

So you plan to continue to use that as a foundation for your business going forward.

That's right. We want to more actively develop introductory services that allow customers to experience the value of utilizing mobility data without special equipment, using existing devices and basic information. Once customers understand the value, we can propose, "How about introducing this system to achieve this next goal?" Even without installing any equipment, simply digitizing business vehicle key management and visualizing the key rental and return status can help understand vehicle operation status and determine whether there are actually enough vehicles and need to increase them, or whether there are too many idle vehicles and need to reduce costs. We will start by using such existing devices and information, or combining them in an effective way, to help customers imagine how mobility data can be used and experience a little value. We believe that this kind of gradual service provision is necessary precisely because mobility data holds great potential.

Finally, based on your experience in creating new businesses through data integration and utilization, please share your honest thoughts about the HULFT Square solution.

As I mentioned earlier, an important theme for our company is how to bring data to a state where it can be used without causing users any hassle, and how to lower the hurdles to that end. From that perspective, I think HULFT Square is a truly wonderful solution, as it makes the "connection" process smooth and easy. At the same time, it also ensures another important theme, "continuous operation," so I think solutions like this will become essential for data utilization in the future.

While mobility data can sometimes be used on its own, it often becomes possible only when multiple data sets are combined, creating even greater value. By using HULFT Square to link our services with various SaaS and solutions, we should be able to create new value. In that respect, HULFT Square is very appealing, and I feel that it shares a similar mindset to ours. I would love for our company to join the network of partners connected through HULFT Square.