“Real Voices”

“I spent my youth completely absorbed in programming after being given a computer in the fifth grade of elementary school.
“A major event that propelled me along the path to the present came in graduate school when a workstation I was using for research was damaged by hacking. I looked into it myself, managing to track down what appeared to be the source code for the vulnerability attack. When examining it, however, I found that the code was totally incomprehensible. It was a terrible shock, because up to then I had felt quite confident about my programming skills. But at the same time, it aroused my curiosity about the dark impenetrable world from which it had come.
“Later, when I started looking for a job, I wanted to work on security-related research or technology development, but at that time Japan’s security industry was not prepared to do anything more than import and sell products from overseas. In view of this, I ended up joining a company in which I could make best use of my expertise in medical image engineering, which was my research specialization at graduate school.
“Nevertheless, I continued to undertake research into security concurrently with working at my day job. I started to develop contacts with engineers and researchers overseas, and one day I was invited to join a US firm called eEye Digital Security, which at that time had gathered together many well-known engineers in the security field from around the world. With such a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity in the offing, I decided to go to America.
“It was a very fulfilling experience in the United States, working day in and day out with responsibility for tasks such as core engine development for some of the company’s flagship products. But at the same time, I felt very uneasy about the fact that the US was so dominant in the security industry insofar as it monopolized critical basic research and technology development and wielded massive business leverage. This meant that, if security risks unique to Japan arose, we would have no locally designed solutions to defend ourselves. After worrying about this for a long time, I finally came to the conclusion that, if nobody else in Japan was prepared to take the risk, I had a duty to step up to the plate myself. This sense of purpose led me to decide to start a business, and I returned to Japan.”

“In the early stages, we occasionally took on R&D projects from other companies to generate cash for day-to-day operations, but simultaneously developed the seeds of technologies of our own. Then in 2008 we had a breakthrough with a defence technology against targeted attacks of a kind that in those days had not yet emerged as a threat, and today it forms the base of ‘FFR yarai’ one of our flagship products.
“I wanted to have a go at commercializing it, but to bring it to the market required a fully fledged organizational structure and funds. It was at this point that I encountered Mitsubishi UFJ Capital.
“We had confidence in our technology, aspiring to create a business not pursued by any global companies, from scratch. However, as we were a mere start-up, I am certain that Mitsubishi UFJ Capital was concerned about how we could proceed. But they came to firmly share our vision of establishing homegrown cybersecurity solutions, and took the decision to provide us with the needed funds.
“They also helped us out by subscribing for our shares in 2011, at a time when we needed additional funds in order to stay afloat and drive future growth. We are forever grateful for their help, and it is no exaggeration to say that without Mitsubishi UFJ Capital we would not be here today.”