Page 21 - Forbes - Asia (July - August 2018)

PROMOTION
establish a laboratory facility in the Swiss
canton of Zug in an area referred to as
Crypto Valley—a global hub for state-of-
the-art blockchain technologies. This has
made it possible for the firm to integrate
secure and speedy, smart contract technol-
ogy, otherwise known as attribution auto-
mation, into the QONECT APP.
“Automatic attribution is a new form of
economic activity that has not existed so
far,” Yoshida adds. “This makes it possible
for contributors who influence and attract
customers to retail outlets to be rewarded
without having to go through inconve-
nient affiliate marketing registration. If this
feeds into user motivation, then it should
produce revolutionary new forms of eco-
nomic activity.”
Creating a New Ecosystem
Automatic attribution makes it possible to
visualize the entire user SNS behavior, even
QONECT Marketing Platform Concept if they go offline. And, by making connec-
QONECT is an ecosystem that realizes posting, information sharing, evaluation of tions to retail outlets, users can pick up gift
updated posts and affiliate automation. Users can send the content of their posts to all coupons and loyalty points. “Up until now,
SNS, merely by posting on the QONECT application. Affiliate points are awarded to if someone visited an outlet after using a
the original users in cases where others who viewed the content on SNS click-through SNS, only the outlet benefited. I don’t think
to make a purchase, or create an advertising lead. Affiliation is credited via the unique that’s fair. A fair economic environment
QONECT Token, and related information, such as points, is managed fairly and safely by can only be achieved by having the store
blockchain technology. that reaps the economic benefit show its
appreciation, in some format, to the person
information, and that if this was the case, Token to the user who helped drum who put the train of economic events into
then it should be possible to create a up business. motion,” Shishido says.
connection between that information AI determines whether the individual Users note that at present as much as
and a SNS. actually visited the restaurant based on 80% of the information on computer net-
“That is why we have developed the their reaction, such as posting a “like” after works is “noise,” and most agree this is not
QONECT APP as a new platform,” he says. reading a post. an acceptable vision of the internet; the real
QONECT aims to comprehensively cover value of the internet is in its ability to com-
Integrating of AI, AR, not only location information, but also out- municate real information, Shishido says.
Blockchain Technology let-specific information, such as free wi-fi The problem lies in the noise created by
Yoshida and Shishido are proposing the provided by restaurants and retail outlets. the disorderly array of affiliate information
QONECT APP as both a SNS integrated “This is the omni user experience, which used to boost access volume.
application and as a platform in its own has been made possible via the rapid devel- But, QONECT is riding to the rescue,
right, presenting users with an unprec- opment of technology in recent years, such and eliminating such algorithms by using
edented connection experience. One as AI, AR and blockchain,” Yoshida says. big data-driven AI. “We see this as the
example of how QONECT works is where a It is also crucial to have a secure protocol start of a really useful computer network,”
restaurant posts an announcement. A user in place for dealing with such information, Yoshida says.
seeing the announcement by confirming and to that end QONECT is planning to
the AR tag with the AR function then vis-
its the restaurant and posts their impres-
sions on QONECT. Another user find the PROFILE
restaurant by using the AR function on their
smartphone and eats there, then posts Naokuni Yoshida: Formerly engaged in corporate finance,
their own impressions on QONECT. By retail product planning and IT strategy and planning
doing so, the AR information will be linked development at Sanwa Bank. After branching out on his own,
SNS information and it is possible to ascer- he provided hands-on support for new business launches that
tain just who made the initial post and who leveraged technology and intellectual property to help small
visited the restaurant,” Yoshida says. and medium-sized independent firms engaged in mergers
This information will be also transmitted and acquisitions. Yoshida is currently focused on business
to the restaurant, which in turn can show support and management in the field of financial technology.
its appreciation by awarding a QONECT